The Padawan Who Lived
by AuthorNo.04
Summary: Ten years after the Battle of Naboo ended, Harry Potter is about to be accepted at the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry on Earth. But soon, the "Boy Who Lived" as he is known by in the Wizarding World, will discover many hidden and potentially dark secrets concerning not only Hogwarts, but himself and those around him as well. - [! MAJOR A.U. !]
1. Prologue - First Meetings (Year 1)

Author's Note #1: IT'S FINALLY HERE‼ The official beginnings of this new installment is a follow-up sequel to the "_As The Force Whills It_" story, and takes place approximately ten years after the events of the first one, and mainly focuses on Harry Potter and the inhabitants of the Wizarding World.

Author's Note #2: And… as I stated at the end of the previous installment, _please_ give me any feedback and/or ideas as to what you all would like to see happen in this sequel story and any ideas for possible future sequels that you can think of, and I'll try to incorporate as many of them into this fanfiction story as much as possible while I'm writing it. But also, any and all thoughts and comments regarding the first installment as a whole, or individual chapters within it, and whether you liked/disliked the story in the '_Post Review_' section down below. Or you can even send me a Private Message (PM) if you want to, whichever you prefer. I'd very much appreciate it. Thank you.

WARNING: Both the rating as well as content _may_ be subject to change throughout this fanfiction story! (_Chapter by chapter._)

Disclaimer: **_I OWN NOTHING!_**

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**Prologue**

**First Meetings**

**Year 1 - Leaky Cauldron/Diagon Alley - Earth**

The city of London in England was jam-packed full with many, many different sorts of people, the large majority of whom either failed to notice or simply went about their own business and didn't really much care as two hooded and dark-robed figures walked side by side down a busy side-street, before turning in the direction of and stood facing a very narrow alleyway centered in between two buildings that was virtually impossible for someone to even get through, which in turn seemed to instantaneously open-up and expand outwardly in scale width-wise right in front of them.

As the two hooded figures stepped through the broadened space and strode down a small path that led into an almost completely enclosed area, they turned to face a wooden door with a sign that hung directly above the frame with the words "_The Leaky Cauldron_" sprawled across it in fancy lettering.

The two figures glanced at each other momentarily before steadily approaching the door. Just as the taller of the two figures reached out with his left hand to turn the knob, he stopped and immediately pulled back his hand, as he sensed someone just on the other side of the door about to open it and depart the lodgings beyond.

Sure enough, the wooden door creaked open and a giant (or rather half-giant) of a man with long thick hair, a very thick long beard and mustache stepped through the doorway out into the daylight, almost bumping into the two hooded and robed figures who stood watching him for a brief instant; the shorter of the two fleetingly staring in awe at the man's lofty stature.

"Oh, pardon me. I didn't see you there," the half-giant remarked politely.

The taller of the two hooded figures nodded in response. "That's quite alright, Hagrid," he politely replied.

The half-giant was immediately taken aback in complete surprise upon hearing a total stranger address him by name. "Do you know me?"

The hooded man promptly shook his head. "No, not personally," he stated. He then gestured to the door. "Come. We have much to discuss."

As all three individuals entered the inn, the half-giant casually walked over to the bar where the bartender was delicately preforming his duties.

"Ah. Back so soon, Hagrid?" he asked informally.

Hagrid shook his head. "No, Tom. It just so happens that this fellow here knows my name. But to be honest, I've never seen him before in my life," he remarked, as he turned and pointed to the two robed figures who steadily walked towards the bar, their hoods completely shielding their faces from view of a growing number of onlookers who stared in absolute silence at them as they approached. The taller of the figures slowly pulled back his hood, revealing a stone-faced Hescand Starrgazer underneath.

"Can I help you, sir?" the bartender asked.

"Yes. My name is Joshua Varner. I'm looking for the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry," Josh answered. "I believe that a few people there in particular will be most eager to meet with a certain someone who has been missing for the past several years now."

Everyone present at the inn were now looking at the two strangely dressed characters, somewhat curious to know what was going on as Josh turned his head to look down at the smaller person standing beside him, who in turn gazed up momentarily for his approval before looking up towards the bartender, and upon removing his hood, inadvertently brushed aside his neatly-kept straight black hair to reveal a lightning-shaped scar above his right eyebrow.

The bartender gaped in sheer disbelief at the sight before him. "My goodness! It… it's Harry Potter!"

With that, the entire room fell dead quiet, as one could almost here a pin drop.

"Welcome back, Mr. Potter. Welcome back," an elderly man cheerfully greeted Harry as he shook the little boy's hand.

"Doris Crockford, Mr. Potter. I can't believe I'm meeting you at last," remarked a kind elderly woman who also came over and shook Potter's hand graciously.

Harry turned to look up at Hagrid, who was absolutely stunned.

"Merlin's beard, Harry! It's really you!" the half-giant exclaimed in amazement.

The little boy gazed up at him and smiled. "Yes, Hagrid. It's really me," he responded in a "_matter-of-factly_" tone of voice while shrugging his shoulders.

Hagrid couldn't help himself as he rather quite suddenly and swiftly threw his massive gorilla-sized arms firmly around the small child in an emotional embrace, causing Harry to jump back ever so slightly with a partially startled expression on his face.

Josh immediately placed a hand on Hagrid's arm, and the half-giant slowly freed Harry from his tightly restraining bear-hug.

"Sorry, Harry. It's just that… well, I've missed you a lot," expressed Hagrid sadly. "After your parents died, and then, well… after your sudden and rather mysterious disappearance, I-"

"That's okay," Harry promptly interrupted with a reassuring and cheery smile, before looking curiously at Hagrid once more. "You knew my parents?"

"Yes, Harry. I did in fact know them," replied Hagrid. "They went to Hogwarts together after all. Although, I think Lily didn't approve of James much at first as I recall."

Doris Crockford stepped closer towards the little boy. "Where have you been all this time, Mr. Potter? There had been several rumors and whispers floating about, as well as some unconfirmed reports, that you were ether missing or had even been kidnapped."

Harry laughed quietly at her statement. "Oh, no. I wasn't kidnapped, I was rescued…" he assured the old woman, as he pointed his finger directly at Varner. "…by him."

Everyone in the room immediately turned to look at the young Jedi in curious wonderment upon hearing this.

Josh smiled and motioned with a nod towards the tables and chairs in the middle of the room. "Come on, why don't we all sit down, and I'll try to explain everything to you as best I can," he remarked.

All of a sudden, the tables and chairs began to levitate up off the ground and move towards each other, thus lining up in a single straight row, before gently lowering back down onto the floor.

Everyone looked around in utter shock and confusion, wondering who or what had just done that.

Hagrid glanced down at the young Potter boy. "Did you do that, Harry?" he asked inquisitively.

"No. I did," Josh answered almost at once. He then gestured for everyone to come and sit around the arranged tables, including the bartender, who pulled out a wand and cast a spell on the bar-ware, and as the lot sat down to chat with the two Jedi, all of the assorted glassware at the bar suddenly began to wash and dry themselves, before neatly stacking themselves on the shelves as well as in the cabinets and cupboards along the back wall.

Over the next few hours, Josh and Harry both told everyone who was there at the inn virtually everything about the night young Potter came to be found abandoned on the roadside all those years ago, excluding the parts concerning Sirius Black. Yet, not before gradually describing in minute detail where they had come from, what they were due to the bizarre clothing that they wore, which included relating who and what the Jedi Order was and what they do, what the Force was and how they used it, and also what the Galactic Republic was and where it's center of operations was located. The Jedi also discussed several other topics like space-travel, various forms of technology, and more to the whole lot.

About an hour or so into the discussions, the Force Ghost of the late Jedi Master, Qui-Gon Jinn, mysteriously appeared in the room to everyone's great surprise. He helped in explaining some of the more confusing things to the inn's occupants. Most notably, things about the Force and it's different aspects. And with the participation of everybody there, including both Josh and Harry, Qui-Gon then performed a demonstration of the Force to further help explain it's nature and existence.

Soon, after both the discussion and the demonstration was over, everyone began conversing amongst themselves over what had just taken place, which of course had only started shortly after Qui-Gon's ghost had vanished from the inn, yet not before his invisible presence had levitated all of the tables and chairs into the air, and then very gently placed them all back in their original positions on the barroom floor, thus leaving everyone in the bar apart from Josh and Harry totally awe-struck and mystified at what had just occurred right before their eyes, given that _no_ spell, charm or incantation of any kind had been cast in order to make those things happen.


	2. Ch 1 - The Mysterious Letter (Year 1)

Author's Note #1: This first chapter is now fully up and ready to view. Enjoy!

Author's Note #2: This fanfiction installment will be a set of multiple stories rolled into one, with it centering primarily on Harry's first few terms at Hogwarts: years 1-4. Also, like the previous fanfiction story, this crossover (as well as the next one, which will hopefully balance out Harry's remaining terms at Hogwarts: years 5-7, with an even amount of Star Wars fanfiction) is going to be a major Alternate Universe (AU) retelling of the Harry Potter series.

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**Chapter 1**

**The Mysterious Letter**

**Year 1 - Jedi Temple - Coruscant**

As the whole of the Jedi Temple was deafly silent in the very late hours, a restless Hescand Starrgazer tossed and turned from side to side on his sleeping pallet inside his chambers, as he was unable to get virtually _any_ amount of needed shuteye.

It had been ruffly a few months since his escape from within the Grid, and reintegrating himself back into the Jedi Order hadn't come easy. Adding to that was the quite recently devastating and tragic news of Qui-Gon Jinn's mysterious death, as well as the taking of his newest Padawan Learner, Anakin Skywalker, under the wing of his former pupil, Obi-Wan Kenobi, who had himself been a full-fledged Jedi Knight for sometime now in order to complete Skywalker's training to Knighthood in Jinn's place. And it was a bit difficult for Starrgazer to fully come to terms with the incident, resulting in him unable to gain relatively little to any amount of sleep for the past week or so. And whenever he did try to sleep, his mind always kept replaying the events that he had experienced while he was stuck inside the confines of the Grid for some unknown reason, which had lasted for little more than an entire decade. Yet although in Hes' mind, those ten years of imprisonment within cyberspace felt a whole lot more like ten lifetimes.

~~ _FLASHBACK_ ~~

_Josh glanced over at the white-haired woman as she and all three of the other women present in the black and grey room stepped into each of their own sarcophagi-like compartments, one along each corner of the walls from where they had previously emerged, after they had finished outfitting him in a full black bodysuit and strange-looking body gear, which included some kind of circular disc that was affixed onto his back armor plate._

_"How do I win the game? What is the main objective here?" he asked bluntly._

_The woman smiled. "To survive," she answered him. As she stepped into the compartment, the lid closed shut and slid back into place on the wall._

_As Josh turned back to look in front of him, two very large doors slowly opened up and a blinding light instantly shown through the crack, prompting the young boy to step forward._

_Discs were being hurled back and forward at lightning-quick speeds across the transparently enclosed space as Josh dodged, ducked, dipped, cartwheeled, flipped, and somersaulted both over, under, and around his opponent's disc as he in turn tossed his own disc multiple times at the other, repeating this 'dance' over and over again with each new combatant that he faced. He also deflected the attacks by using his own disc like a shield of sorts from time to time, while his opponents in turn did just the same._

_The room lit up in pure white as Josh stepped off the elevating platform into what appeared to be a huge living space. As the black-haired woman next to him walked forward, she gradually approached a man with dark greyish hair who was sitting with his legs underneath him, motionless as a statue. Whispering something to him that Josh couldn't quite hear, the man steadily rose to his feet, before turning around to face the boy directly._

_"Who are you?" he asked curiously._

_Josh remained silent for a moment or two before he spoke. "Josh. Joshua Varner," he replied. "Are you- Are you Kevin Flynn?"_

_The man nodded firmly at his question. "I am. But__…__how did you get here? Where are you from?"_

_Upon hearing this, Varner exhaled an apprehensive sigh of doubt, looking most unsure of himself and just how to exactly go about explaining things to both persons standing before him. When in all reality, it was still rather unclear as to how or why he came to be inside this place at all. Or even for what purpose, for that matter._

_"Ahhh, well…," the boy started to enunciate, before cutting himself short, not knowing exactly what to say next, leaving his mouth ajar._

_Both of the individuals merely stood staring at him for a short while, waiting patiently for the boy to speak, who just remained still and silent. Until finally, the man cocked his head ever so slightly to his right with one eyebrow raised in curious anticipation of what Josh was going to either say or do next._

_Josh slowly closed his mouth as he promptly exhaled a heavy sigh. "It's a really, REALLY__…__long story," he asserted at last._

_Over the next several years, or cycles as Flynn commonly referred to them as, Josh trained long and hard under him in the very deadly art of both disc-style combat and swordsmanship (thereby wielding a light sword that was spawned using a multi-tool simply known as a baton which was capable of producing a variety of usable objects), as well as learning both computer science and hacking skills, and numerous other technology-related crafts as well. Flynn also told Varner everything there was to know about the Grid and the rogue administrative control program known as CLU, both of which were created by Kevin Flynn himself less than a decade earlier._

_Varner in turn gradually told Kevin Flynn everything about what had happened to him over the course of the first few weeks, including the fact that he quite randomly and unexpectedly received a short message on his "phone" which turned out to be both Flynn's full name and number, as well as both a location and time of when and where to meet._

_He also explained what the Force was and how it was utilized, everything about the Jedi Order and what they do, everything about the Galactic Republic and the Senate, as well as the galaxy at large, about himself and how he gained his superpowers, and much more._

_The boy had at one point in time hoped to try and escape the Grid and leave the system during the first days of his otherwise lengthy stay, but his hopes of doing so were soon dashed when he saw the Portal, which was essentially a gateway between the system and the real world, close itself in the distance right before his own two eyes, effectively trapping him inside the Grid along with Flynn for all of eternity, as Flynn explained to Josh that the Portal used enormous amounts of power to remain open, which couldn't last for very long. And when Josh suggested that they try and reopen the Portal, and that he possessed the ability to manipulate energy, thereby capable of generating enough power to keep the Portal open indefinitely, Flynn told him that the Portal could only be opened from outside the system in the real world._

_Flynn had also surmised that the message that was sent to Josh, had if fact come from CLU himself, and that he had initially meant it for someone else entirely. But somehow, Josh had inadvertently received it by mistake._

_As time passed, Josh slowly but surely started to accept that he was NEVER going to get out of that place. Until one fateful night, all of that changed._

_While out on routine patrol, Flynn's confidante and apprentice, Quorra, whom Josh had accompanied back to Kevin Flynn's hideout after the two of them had met and she in turn helped the young boy to escape the Game Grid, was nearing the location known as the Sea of Simulation. All of a sudden, the Portal which provided the only means of escape from the Grid, mysteriously opened-up seemingly all by itself. Seeing this happen almost directly in front of her line of sight, Quorra immediately raced back to notify Flynn of what had just now occurred._

_Racing through the streets in a light cycle, Josh made his way to the "End of Line" club, hoping to meet with someone called Zuse, whom Quorra had mentioned could provide him with the means of getting to the Portal, even though it wasn't going to be at all easy nor that simple. Yet, before he departed for the club's location, Varner insisted that Flynn come along with him so that he might be able to return home to his family, of which the elder man refused._

_"I don't understand. Why aren't you taking this chance to go home?" asked Josh._

_Flynn sighed heavily. "Because life has a way of moving you past things such as hopes and dreams, kid," he voiced firmly. "Too much time has gone by for me. The life I once had? That's gone now."_

_Josh nodded his head understandably, but was greatly disappointed that his mentor was unwilling to leave the system and return to his family. He then shook Flynn's hand and the two men hugged each other goodbye for the last time._

_As Josh flew through the blackened skies on his light jet, he suddenly noticed a bunch of red glowing ships behind him that were approaching his position fast. He gunned the jet's engines to full throttle, and used the Force to propel the craft even further beyond it's capabilities._

_Raising both of his arms high above his head, Varner released the Master Disc, of which he had copied from Flynn's original with his permission, into the gateway and a few short moments later a blinding flash of white light erupted in front of the young man's eyes._

~~ _FLASHBACK ENDS_ ~~

Snapping his eyes wide-open, Hes bolted upright into a sitting position on his sleeping pallet. His heart was racing fast and he was breathing rather heavily. Upon taking in his immediate surroundings within the darkness, the young man closed his eyes and began to steady himself, breathing in and out deeply as well as slowly in order to bring his heart-rate down to normal, while at the same time using a meditation technique to clear his head. Shortly afterwards, Hes slowly rose to his feet and walked out of his chambers.

The large hallways and corridors that made-up the numerous sleeping chambers on multiple levels of the Temple were dimly lit, softly illuminating the way towards Grandmaster Yoda's private chambers as the young Jedi went directly there. And as he rounded a corner, Hes abruptly noticed a little boy who was just coming out of his own chambers, looking mildly distressed. Casually approaching the child, Starrgazer looked down at him as the small boy glanced up in return; a lightning-shaped scar clearly visible above his right eyebrow.

"Harry? Are you all right?" asked Hes concerned.

Harry Potter softly shook his head in response as he blinked. The young Jedi could sense just what it was that bothered him. Slowly crouching down on one knee to be nearly at eye-level with the boy, Hes gently rested a compassionate hand on his shoulder. He nodded to himself as he looked down for a brief instant, before raising his gaze to meet Harry's again.

"It's that same dream again, huh?" he surmised gently, prompting Harry to nod his head in response.

Hes sighed and rose to his feet once more. "Well, I was just about to go and see Master Yoda. You can come along if you want," he offered generously.

Upon hearing this, Harry glanced up at him with a big smile on his face. And as Starrgazer took the little boy's hand into his own, the two of them made their way directly to the Grandmaster's private chambers.

Early the next morning, as young Potter was getting ready for the first lessons of the day with Master Yoda and a handful of other pupils, he could sense something, or rather _someone_, familiar through the Force who was steadily approaching the Jedi Temple. Smiling cheerfully to himself, Harry quickly finished-up with what he was doing and immediately exited his chambers, zipping rather insanely fast through the many halls and corridors using Force Speed until he reached the Temple's entrance.

As the entrance doors slowly opened-up, a tall man with long wavy black hair and a short black beard and mustache, stepped through the doorway into the Temple. He wore a tunic and hooded robes that were of a _slightly_ different style, design, and color than those of commonly traditional Jedi robes, which made him stand out from all the rest of the other Jedi there.

Harry smiled quite happily as the man removed his hood and smiled back down at him in turn.

"Sirius!" exclaimed Harry as he ran to and firmly embraced his godfather, wrapping his arms as tightly as he could around the man's waist.

Black put his strong arms around the little boy, hugging him back. "Hey, Harry! It's good to see you. But, what are you doing here? Aren't you supposed to be at your lessons by now?"

Harry pulled away from Sirius and nodded. "Yeah, I know. I was just coming over here to see you," he expressed. "I've missed you a lot, Sirius."

Sirius nodded understandably so. "All right, well you'd better get going," he advised. "You wouldn't want to get into any trouble with Master Yoda now, would you?"

The little boy shook his head "no" and waved goodbye to his godfather as he turned around and promptly raced off to where his first session was to take place.

A short time later, while outside in the training ground as he was sparing with other students in lightsaber combat training, Harry very suddenly began to sense something coming toward the grounds from high up above them in the atmosphere. Looking skyward, he caught a glimpse of a small white winged creature that appeared to be flying around in frantic circles. The poor thing was obviously quite rather disoriented and confused out of it's small mind, all from what Harry was able to observe and discern was happening.

All of a sudden, a speeder flew past the Jedi Temple directly overhead of the training ground, very nearly colliding with and almost injuring the small winged animal in midair. But the creature successfully managed to avoid getting hit by the vehicle just in the nick of time. Except in doing so, the rush of air that came from the speeder going by sent the little creature spiraling and then tumbling out of control, before Harry could clearly see that it was falling ever closer towards a giant uneti tree that was standing just off to one area of the training ground.

"Master Yoda, look!" shouted Harry to the little green Jedi Master who was standing just a few yards away. He pointed up at the small white creature that was falling dangerously close toward the uneti tree and was about to land hard onto it's branches within mere seconds.

Looking up at where Harry was pointing to, Yoda immediately reached out his hand and used the Force to very quickly halt the animal's rapid descent, before ever so slowly moving the small winged thing away from the tree and then gently lowering it safely to the ground.

Switching off their lightsabers, the students all gathered around the small winged animal, curious to see just what it was as they had never come across any of it's own species of bird before. Harry squatted down on his heels to get a closer look at the creature as it glanced around a bit nervously in turn at all of the students who were crowding over it.

"Guys, back up a little. I think you're scaring it," said Harry.

All of the other surrounding students gradually backed away as Potter had insisted, but only a very little so that they could still get a clear glimpse of the strange bird-like creature. And as the small winged animal began to slowly relax, trying to get it's bearings and familiarize itself with it's new surroundings, Harry noticed something that was white in color and rectangular-shaped firmly clasped in between it's beak.

Ever so gently and slowly reaching out with his right hand to gingerly take the object from the animal's beak, Harry very steadily and lightly stroked it's head with the palm of his free hand, which the little creature seemed to like. And after a few minutes of lightly petting it, Harry was just about to stand up straight and closely examine the object in his hand, when his godfather casually walked up to him and the other students, curious as to know what it was they were all looking at.

"Hey, Harry! What's going on?" inquired Sirius.

Potter immediately looked up at his godfather with a hint of confusion on his face. "Sirius, we saw this winged creature flying around in circles overhead a couple minutes ago before it almost got knocked out of the air by a passing speeder. Do you know what it is?"

Sirius looked down in absolute shock and surprise at the animal that was now softly nudging itself close to Harry, tenderly rubbing up against his knee, clearly wanting to be petted once more by the young lad.

"That's an owl. A- a snowy owl," answered Sirius, sounding rather bewildered and startled. "What ever would it be doing all the way out here?"

Harry shook his head. "Don't know. But it was apparently carrying this," he said, handing the object directly to his godfather.

Black immediately recognized the object that he was presently holding in his hand to be a small white envelope with only four words written on the front of it in big fancy lettering. He promptly handed the envelope to Harry; telling the little boy what it was and that it was addressed only to him.

Glancing down curiously at the front of the envelope, Harry proceeded to read the addressed writing out loud to everyone who was present.

'_To Mr. H. Potter_'

"Go on! Open it up, Harry!" exclaimed a young boy, Merl Kullat, who was standing close beside him. He was one of Harry's best friends, having red hair, blue eyes, and pale-looking skin.

Harry turned the envelope over and carefully pulled back the seal which secured the flap into place on the back of it. Then, lifting up the flap, he saw a neatly folded piece of paper inside, and upon removing it, unfolded the paper and immediately noticed a strange-looking symbol marked at it's top in the exact center.

"Well, what does it say, Harry?" asked Merl a bit impatiently.

"Alright, Merl, alright! Don't rush me!" Harry exclaimed in a slight tone of annoyance.

He then began to read the contents of the paper out-loud as everyone of the other students present carefully gathered around Potter, but not so much that it made him feel like they were crowding him.

'HOGWARTS SCHOOL _of_ WITCHCRAFT _and_ WIZARDRY'

'Headmaster: Albus Dumbledore'

'_(Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorc., Chf. Warlock, Supreme Mugwump, International Confed. of Wizards)_'

'Dear Mr. Potter, wherever or whenever you are at this moment, we hope and pray that this letter finds it's way to you, and that you are safe and sound. Our thoughts and prayers, as well as those of each and every member of the entire magical community, have I truly believe at long last been answered these many long years that you are very much alive and well, if you have indeed just received and are now reading this letter. Furthermore, we are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment. Term begins on September 1. We await your owl by no later than July 31.'

'Yours sincerely,'

'**_Minerva McGonagall_**'

'Minerva McGonagall, _Deputy Headmistress_'

As Harry finished reciting the letter aloud, many of the students present looked around at one another in total confusion. _Hogwarts?_ _Magical community?_ None of what they had just heard made virtually any sense to them whatsoever. Who was this "_Albus Dumbledore_" anyways? As well as whoever "_Minerva McGonagall_" was for that matter. This was all rather very bemusing and quite strange to say the least.

The young Potter boy, however, was looking a bit perplexed for a very different reason altogether. _What exactly did the writer of this mysterious _'_letter_'_ mean when saying "alive and well?" Surely he wasn't in any kind of eminent danger, was he? _Harry had heard countless stories about both Hogwarts and the magical community over the years from Sirius, but almost nothing about being in any sort of danger, even though Black had told him about his parents, Lily and James, though virtually little about how they died; only that they died protecting him from _someone_ who had wanted to see him dead, yet wouldn't say who or why. His mind was starting to swirl with questions about what certain contents of this '_letter_' meant.

Slowly rising to his feet, Harry looked up at Sirius as he turned to face him, who in turn was smiling proudly down at the little boy after hearing what Harry had just now read in the letter concerning his acceptance into the school.

"Um, Sirius, am I in any danger?" Potter asked rather suddenly.

Black's expression immediately changed as he sighed under his breath. "No, Harry," he answered at once. "You're not in any danger, I can assure you. But it looks as though it's high time that I explained _everything_, of which I suppose I should have told you long ago beforehand."

Turning to face Master Yoda, Sirius requested that Harry be excused from his lessons early so that both he and his godson could go to Black's own chambers and talk in private concerning the acceptance letter that Potter had received from Hogwarts, to which the small green Jedi Master gladly gave his approval for them to do so, and as the two casually made their way toward Sirius' chambers, with the little white owl now resting on Harry's arm and the little boy's free-hand gently stroking it's feathers while Potter held it near to him, after Black showed him how to correctly handle such a small creature of that kind, Hes quite leisurely strode up to the both of them from where he had just come in another area of the Temple.

"Hey, Harry!" the young Jedi Knight exclaimed to the little boy, before turning his gaze on Black. "Hey, Sirius. What's up? Where are you both off to?"

Sirius exhaled a deep and heavy sigh under his breath. "We need to talk, Josh," he expressed strongly. "In private. Harry just received his acceptance letter from the Hogwarts School, and I think that it's now come time that we told him what he needs to know."

Upon hearing this, Hes exhaled under his breath also, before nodding fully in agreement. The three of them then casually made their way directly to Sirius' chambers, where Harry's godfather told him about the night that the Dark Lord known as Voldemort had come to the Potter's residence and had murdered both of his parents, Lily and James, before attempting and utterly failing to kill him as well.

"But, _why_ did he try to kill me, Sirius?" asked Harry directly after Black had finished. "That's what I want to know. _Why?_ What was his reason for wanting me dead?"

Sirius let out a long sigh of sheer uncertainty. "I don't rightly know if there was a personal reason for him wanting _you_ dead, Harry? Yet I do know however that the main reason that he murdered your mother and father was because they were betrayed by a close friend of theirs."

"Who was it?" asked Hes a bit curiously.

Black turned his gaze towards the Jedi Knight; a fiery look in his eyes. "His name… was Peter Pettigrew."

Harry lowered his head sorrowfully, still a bit disappointed with not completely knowing the reason or reasons for Voldemort wanting him to be gone. _He had never done anything to the Dark Lord to deserve this, so why was Voldemort totally bent on slaying him: a helpless infant, that he was back then?_

Josh then began to tell Harry about the night that he found him laying in the middle of a deserted side-road, as well as the full circumstances surrounding how the little boy came to be rescued and eventually taken, along with how he encountered and then brought Sirius, back to Coruscant aboard the Naboo royal starship.

"Who was it that abandoned me?" Harry asked inquisitively.

Sirius looked down at his godson. "Your aunt and uncle, Harry. Petunia and Vernon Dursley. _She_ was your mother's sister. And as I understand it, Petunia was rather quite jealous of her."

"She most certainly had to have been for the both of them to just simply abandon you for dead like that, kid," Josh mouthed softly, to the point of it almost being incoherent.

Harry simply just smiled as he glanced up at his godfather once more. "Well, if they hadn't abandoned me, then I won't be here right now with you, Sirius."

Black smiled down warmly at the little boy in return, and the two softly embraced each other, though rather carefully, so as not to injury the small white owl that was still perched on Harry's arm.

Sometime later, the three individuals then discussed how exactly Harry was going to go about attending the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry on Earth, and more importantly, who would be the one to take him there, since Sirius was most likely still considered to be an escaped prisoner by the magical community's law enforcement division, not to mention the rest of the entire wizarding community of Britain, England at large also.

After a while, it was finally decided that Hes would be the one to take Harry to the school and they would both go to the Jedi Council to request an extended leave of absence for the two of them in order for Potter to not only attend Hogwarts, but also for Starrgazer to help the little boy continue with his Jedi training as his unofficial Master, as well as be able to depart for Earth within the next twenty-four hours or so if they were going to meet the required deadline.

Once the duo had met with the High Council to explain the situation, and the Council had in turn obliged their request for an extended leave, they then immediately set to work preparing for the long journey ahead of them the very next morning. And after Harry had released the owl that very same evening, waving good-bye to the small winged animal as it took flight, soaring high into air towards a large swathe of thick clouds, careful to avoid colliding with any oncoming air-traffic as it promptly disappeared into the clouds without a single trace.

Harry then went to sleep that night in his chambers, wondering about what all the different sorts of excitement and adventure which awaited him at the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry that were to come.


	3. Ch 2 - Ascending the Stairs (Year 1)

Author's Note: This chapter is fully up and ready to view. Let me know of any writing errors in it, and please review.

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**Chapter 2**

**Ascending the Stairs**

**Year 1 - Hagrid's Hut/Hogwarts Castle - Earth**

After nearly everyone had departed from the inn that evening, Harry, Josh, and Hagrid all sat down together around a table and quietly chatted with one another, mostly about things concerning the state of the magical community at the present time and what'd happened in the ten years since young Potter's absence from the world in general, but also of the events relating to the night in which both of Harry's parents, Lily and James, were cold-bloodedly murdered by a certain dark wizard, of whom _everyone_ in the entire magical community were absolutely terrified to either say his name out loud, or to even mentally think it for that matter.

"What- What was his name? This… Dark Lord you mentioned?" asked Harry as he momentarily sighed under his breath, recognizing full-well that Hagrid wouldn't know that he was already completely aware of the identity of Voldemort due to his conversation with Sirius at the Jedi Temple earlier.

Hagrid knew this was going to be very, VERY difficult for him to say as he took in a deep breath after clearing his throat. "His name was V-" He sighed, realizing that it was going to be even _WAY_ harder than he initially thought. "His name was V-"

Both Josh and Harry exchanged brief glances at each other; their expressions communicating back and forth between themselves about whether or not they should just come right out and tell Hagrid of the fact that the little boy already knew the Dark Lord's name, but also whether or not they should tell him about Sirius Black as well, with little Harry finally deciding after a few brief and tense moments that he was going to tell the half-giant that he already knew of Voldemort's identity, as well as the fact that Sirius Black had primarily been the one who was looking after him at the Jedi Temple on Coruscant over the last ten years.

Potter then exhaled a heavy sigh under his breath, preparing to speak. "It's alright, Hagrid. You don't have to tell me," he gently stated at last. "I already know."

The half-giant's eyes widened in absolute surprise and confusion upon hearing Harry say that. "Blimey, Harry! What do you mean you know? _How?_"

Harry glanced behind him for a quick moment at the few remaining people who were still in the bar, before turning back around to face Hagrid again, signaling for the half-giant to lean in a bit closer so that the little boy could whisper into his ear.

"I'll tell you. But not here. We need to go somewhere else that's much more private," he softly whispered into Hagrid's ear. "Do you know of anyplace else we can talk?"

The half-giant nodded in response. "Yes, there is, Harry. Come along now," he uttered solemnly, and then promptly stood up from the table with both Harry and Josh following suit.

As the trio walked towards the exit, the bartender expressed a sincere farewell to both Harry and Josh, who both conveyed a fervent goodbye to him in turn.

"Good-evening, Hagrid! Next time, I presume?" the bartender called-out towards the half-giant.

Hagrid turned and nodded at him with a small smile in reply. "Of course! See ya, Tom!"

Once the three individuals stepped outside, closing the door behind them, Harry turned to face Hagrid directly and looked up at him. "So, where are we going, Hagrid?"

"We'll go to my hut. It's located on the Hogwarts grounds, near to the castle," the half-giant replied.

Harry looked rather confused. "Where's the castle located, Hagrid?" he asked curiously. "We didn't see anything that resembled a castle anywhere nearby when Josh and I arrived."

Hagrid smirked as he glanced down at the little boy. "That's because it's many miles away from here, Harry," he answered. "It's also well-hidden by protective enchantments."

Potter nodded understandably just as Hagrid reached into his coat-pocket and suddenly pulled out what appeared to be a rather tiny object of some sort, which looked exactly like the toy version of a motorcycle, with a VERY tiny sidecar attached to it from what Josh could see, and put it on the ground a number of feet away from them. Then, upon taking out what looked like an umbrella from inside his coat, Hagrid pointed it directly at the tiny motorcycle and sidecar, which then all of a sudden to both Josh and Harry's astonishment quite literally began to grow in both scale and dimension as the half-giant stepped away from the objects after placing them on the ground, until they were both precisely the exact size that was required to accommodate for someone of the his physical stature.

Upon examining the objects a bit more closely for an instant, Josh immediately realized that it was most definitely a _real_ motorcycle and sidecar that had simply been shrunken down to pocket-size. "Hmm, well, impressive!" he exclaimed with sheer amazement.

"Eh, it's nothing really," remarked Hagrid. "Merely a simple charm is all."

As Hagrid got on the motorcycle, he gestured for Harry to climb into the sidecar next to him, and as Potter climbed inside he immediately looked over at Varner who shook his head before promptly levitating himself up off the ground and hovered in the air just a few meters above them.

"I'll follow alongside you," Josh declared, motioning with his right arm for the half-giant to get a head-start.

Nodding in response, Hagrid revved-up the engine on the motorcycle and just a few moments later, both he and Harry were soaring through the evening sky with Josh gliding along beside them as the three made their way towards the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, as well as to the half-giant's hut.

After several minutes, the trio finally reached their destination point, with the motorcycle ever so slowly and gracefully descending down onto an exceedingly long walkway that stretched far across the castle grounds in many different directions, stopping just a number of yards away from a moderately-sized, part tepee, part cabin-like structure that was comprised of primarily stone and wood, which sat near the border of a gigantic thicket of large trees. And once Josh slowly lowered himself to the ground immediately after Harry and Hagrid had landed on the walkway, they all casually approached the hovel just as the noise of a dog that promptly started barking loudly could be heard from directly on the other side of the entry door.

"Oh, shut up, you silly mongrel!" Hagrid yelled at the animal as he swung the door wide-open to reveal a massively large interior, which to both Harry and Josh's first impressions, appeared to be _far_ more spacious in scale on the inside of the hut than it did on the outside.

"Wow!" exclaimed Harry in astonishment, upon stepping inside the hut and looking all around him at it's massive interior. "This place is huge!"

Casually striding over towards a kitchen area, Hagrid proceeded to fill-up a teakettle with water, before placing it on a stove to get it ready to boil. "Tea, anyone?"

Both Josh and Harry graciously accepted the offer before Josh strode over to Hagrid. "Here, let me get that for you," the young Jedi politely voiced as he placed his hand on the kettle, and a moment later, it began to hiss rather loudly, indicating that the water had reached it's boiling point.

Looking rather surprised for a minute, Hagrid then gathered up some tea leaves which were carefully stored away in one of the kitchen cabinets, and placed them into the boiling water through the opened top of the kettle before closing the lid, and after several minutes of allowing the leaves to steep through into the water, he then poured both Harry and Josh a nice and steamy-hot cup of tea into some teacups that he had placed on the dining table, before pouring a cup for himself.

"Oh, careful, Harry!" exclaimed Josh before the little boy was about to take a sip after the trio sat down around the table. "It might be too hot for you right now. And I don't think you'd wanna be burning your mouth or tongue off."

Harry nodded understandably in agreement before turning to look directly at the half-giant. "Anyway, the reason I wanted to talk in private with you, Hagrid, is because of, well…" Potter suddenly found it a little difficult to say what it was that he wanted to tell the half-giant, knowing that he probably considered Sirius Black to be entirely guilty of whatever crimes that the little boy's godfather had been wrongfully accused of committing.

Hagrid stared curiously at him, quite unsure of just what it was that the little boy was trying to say. "What is it, Harry?"

Potter glanced over at Josh for a brief instant, who in turn nodded at him assuredly, before turning his gaze back toward the half-giant again. "It's about Sirius Black. You see, for the past ten years or so, he's primarily been the one who has taken care of me."

Before Hagrid could either respond and/or react to this stunning revelation, Harry immediately began to explain to him the course of events surrounding the last decade of both how and why Sirius Black was looking after the young Potter boy and that it was actually him who told Harry about Voldemort, including the identity of the man, Peter Pettigrew, who was in fact the one who had both sold-out the Potters location to Voldemort as well as framed Black for murder, following-up with Varner subsequently filling in the blanks concerning his involvement, telling Hagrid that it was the will of the Force that Sirius Black was meant to go with his godson to Coruscant and become his primary caregiver, adding that _if_ it wasn't meant to be that way, then Josh most likely would _never_ have had those visions of him to begin with.

Once the three of them had finished drinking their tea, Hagrid cleaned the dishes off before putting them back into the cupboards in the kitchen area, and then the trio went directly to the office of the school's Headmaster, Albus Dumbledore, inside the castle. As the half-giant led the way through it's many halls and corridors, Harry noticed to his great surprise that all of the paintings which adorned many of the castle walls were in fact moving, almost as if they were somehow alive.

Upon approaching a large gargoyle-looking statue, Hagrid instructed both Josh and Harry to step through the archway into the space where the statue was located, and once both Jedi had promptly entered the narrow gap, the half-giant then turned to stand directly facing in front of the gargoyle statue.

"Curly Wurly," he uttered at once, and suddenly the gargoyle began to slowly turn round clockwise as it rose up into the air, revealing a hidden stone staircase within the floor underneath it that gradually ascended up through the constrictive space of what appeared to be a rather tall high-rise tower just above Harry and Josh's heads when they both glanced upward after stepping through the archway, until the statue finally halted it's climb to the very top of the tower, which in turn revealed another archway that lead straight to a large door at the far end of a short corridor.

As the two individuals walked slowly towards the door just ahead of them, both Harry and Josh could almost clearly make out two elderly-sounding voices, one male and the other female, on the other side of the large door.

Using his supremely enhanced sense of hearing, Josh focused in on the voices and was now quite clearly able to discern what they were both saying.

"_I know you're worried, Minerva. I am as well. But there's simply no way to know for sure until he actually arrives,_" the male voice uttered calmly.

"_But the Sorting is only a few days away, Albus! A new gathering of first-year students is about to take place at Hogwarts this year, and if he's not among them, then I'd be absolutely certain that something most awful has happened to him!_" the female exclaimed a bit frantically.

Upon approaching the door, there was a brief moment of silence from what Josh could tell before the male voice spoke-up again.

"_Well, perhaps- Perhaps they came back for him. Maybe they both thought the danger was finally past and thus decided to retrieve him. Maybe even…both of them, you think?_"

"_Highly unlikely, Albus. You and I both know what he said. He was adamantly clear as crystal__…__that it was for the best. They both were; that it was the only way to keep their children safe._"

Sporting a look of utter confusion for a brief moment, Josh stepped directly in front of the large door and gently knocked on it a few times, promptly alerting the two individuals within the room on the other side to his presence.

"_Yes, come in._"

As Josh slowly pushed the door wide-open, both he and Harry stepped through the doorway and into what appeared to be some kind of a strange-looking office. It was a large and beautifully decorated circular room, and the walls were adorned with many different forms of live-motion portraits. On opposite corners of the room, a number of curious silver instruments rested atop spindle-legged tables which were placed up against the far walls; everyone of them whirring and blowing out small puffs of smoke. At the very center of a raised platform which was flanked by a few short steps, sat an enormous claw-footed wooden desk and a huge lavishly-carved wooden chair.

The two individuals who stood talking with each other promptly turned around just as both of the Jedi slowly approached them.

"Who- Who are you?" the woman asked, looking rather startled at first, until she noticed the lightning-shaped scar above Harry's eyebrow. "_Potter?!_"

The little boy nodded to her in response. "Are you… Minerva McGonagall?"

When the woman nodded at his question, Harry reached into his robes and produced the acceptance letter which he had received back on Coruscant via the owl. He was about to hand it over to her, when she politely and gently stopped him from giving it back to her.

"Keep that with you, Potter. You're going to need the list of supplies that I provided another with that letter, now."

Harry nodded in reply. "Okay." He looked up at McGonagall once again after stuffing the letter back into his robes. "Um, about that, where do I go to get these supplies from. And… how am I going to pay for them? I haven't any money to buy this stuff with."

"You're money's at Gringotts, dear," McGonagall stated softly. "That's the Wizarding Bank which is located in Diagon Alley. You're mother and father both left a rather substantial fortune to you prior to them… _passing away._"

Harry slowly walked over to her and gently placed a firmly comforting hand on her lower arm, as McGonagall looked like she was getting close to having an emotional breakdown upon mentioning the little boy's deceased parents.

As Minerva knelt down to be at eye-level with Potter, the little boy smiled ever so kindly, yet sadly, at her. "It's okay," he said gently. "I can understand how much you miss them. I do, too."

Josh then gradually stepped closer toward the two elders. "I suppose that it's come time to explain things to you both concerning where Harry has been for the last several years," he declared solemnly, though only after formally introducing himself to them.

Dumbledore nodded in agreement, and upon retrieving his wand from inside his robes, conjured up two couches that sat facing each other in an empty area of the room. And once all four individuals were comfortably seated, with Harry and Josh both sitting directly across from Dumbledore and McGonagall, Varner first went into great detail about where Harry had been living for the past decade, as well as who the Jedi were, what they do, what the Force was, and so-on and so-forth. He then went on to explain how Harry had in fact come to be rescued by him all those years ago, and Minerva quite literally whirled on Albus in a fiery rage the instant Josh finished telling her of how Potter had been abandoned on a deserted side-road and left for dead.

****_WACK__!_****

Albus was immediately jolted back up again his seat in absolute shock and dismay upon getting slapped across the face by a decidedly livid Minerva; a motion that almost caused his half-moon glasses to go flying clean off his nose, and even made Harry and Josh both jump back in complete surprise.

"_DAMN YOU, ALBUS PERCIVAL WULFRIC BRIAN DUMBLEDORE‼_" she practically shrieked in the old man's face; her eyes piercing him like ice-cold daggers. "_I warned you that it was a very bad idea to leave him there…with those horrid Muggles!_"

Varner himself was particularly stunned into near shock at seeing McGonagall's terrifying expression at that very moment, and rather briefly considered making a direct beeline for the office's main door. Literally _nothing_ in the wider galaxy had the capability to petrify him, even in the slightest, to the point at which the look on Minerva's face had just now done so.

'_Holy shit!_' the young Jedi Knight immediately thought to himself. '_I sure as hell wouldn't wanna piss her off!_'

**_Knock. Knock. Knock._**

All of a sudden, there was a rather sharp and partially loud knock on the office door, which in turn snapped Josh out of his sense of shock, and alerted everyone in the room to the presence of another as yet unknown visitor.

"Come in!" McGonagall shouted towards the door of the office, her tone still very much aggravated and fierce.

The office door slowly creaked open and a short woman with reddish hair cautiously stepped through the doorway into the room.

"Hello? Am I interrupting anything at the moment?" she asked warily, just as everyone promptly got to their feet, with Albus quickly replacing the half-moon glasses he was wearing correctly back onto the bridge of his nose again.

"Uh, no. No, of course not. Please, come in, Mrs. Weasley," Minerva replied calmly.

As the woman steadily approached the small group, she all of a sudden halted in her tracks when she caught sight of both Josh and Harry as they turned around to face her direction.

"It can't be," she uttered aloud to herself, as she crossed over to personally greet Harry and shake the little boy's hand gently. "Oh, my goodness! It is you! Harry Potter! I can't tell you how joyously wonderful this is, meeting you here!"

"Hello, um, Mrs. Weasley, is it?" replied Harry respectively.

"Oh, please. Call me Molly, dear," Mrs. Weasley insisted kindly.

"What can we do for you, Molly," asked Dumbledore.

Molly nodded to herself, wanting to get right to the point of the matter as to why she had come to the Headmaster's Office in the late evening hours.

"Actually, the reason I was coming round here was because it has something to do with Harry himself, actually," Molly claimed a tad frankly.

Harry instantly looked a little surprised upon hearing that. "Me?" he asked curiously. "I don't really understand. What does this have to do with me? Josh and I both just arrived here on Earth earlier today."

"Oh, not to worry, dear," Molly assured him softly. "It's just that the little one whom we've been looking after has recently been calling out your name, both while she's asleep at night and also while she's awake in the daytime. It's only been going on for roughly no more than a day or so now, and at first Arthur and I both found it a bit strange that she'd be saying the name of someone her didn't even know. But now, it would seem to be something more than we thought, given that you're here now, Harry. Though, for the life of me, we still can't figure out why she would be saying your name to begin with."

"How is she doing, by the way?" asked McGonagall.

"She's quite well. Thank you, Minerva," Molly answered.

As Josh stepped closer towards Mrs. Weasley, curious to know who it was that she was talking about, the redhead glanced up at him, and upon the two of them making eye-contact, she instantly recognized the young Jedi Knight as being the same individual who had once saved her son from the deranged psychopathic witch, Bellatrix Lestrange, a decade prior. And even though Varner had fully grown into a rather hansom young adult, she knew at once that it was him. _It simply had to be._

"_YOU?!_" she exclaimed frantically.

Josh momentarily looked rather taken aback by the redhead's exclamation towards him. "Yes?" he responded in a supposedly confused manner, though he was obviously trying to hide the fact that he knew right away that the woman clearly recognized who he was from ten years earlier.

Molly immediately walked over towards McGonagall and Albus. "Professor Dumbledore, that's him! The young boy I told you about ten years ago. He's the one who saved Ronald as baby from being taken by Bellatrix Lestrange, I'm absolutely sure of it."

Josh couldn't hide it any longer as he lowered his head slightly and a broad smile curled across his lips. He exhaled in absolute defeat, knowing full-well that she clearly remembered him, before raising his head up to look at her directly.

"Hello, Mrs. Weasley," he expressed warmly. "It's good to see you again."

She nodded in reply. "Oh, by the way, I didn't catch your name last time, dear," she stated bluntly.

Josh slowly approached her, reaching out to shake her hand in greeting. "I'm Josh. Joshua Varner," he replied.

"Well. It sure is nice to meet you, Mr. Varner," Molly declared happily. "Oh, and thank you so very much for what you did for us."

The young Jedi Knight casually nodded in response of her gratitude towards him. "Glad I could help."


	4. Ch 3 - Regrets of the Past (Year 1)

Author's Note: This chapter is now fully up and ready to view. Let me know of any writing errors in it, and also let me know if the content is too graphic for the below chapter rating, and I'll try to water it down if I can.

WARNING: Mentions of strong violence/abuse towards children, alcoholism, and some language.

Rated: Fiction M (_I've given this chapter an M rating for very specific reasons! If you don't like it, then don't read it!_)

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**Chapter 3**

**Regrets**** of the Past**

**Year 1 - The Burrow - Earth**

After the meeting with McGonagall and Dumbledore had ended, Molly Weasley requested that both Josh and Harry accompany her back to the Weasley's residence (_what she referred to as "The Burrow"_), which was located on the outskirts of Ottery St Catchpole: a small village that resided in Devon, England.

Upon arriving at the location of the Weasley's home, both Josh and Harry noticed right away that the place had a rather oddly-shaped design about it, for it looked as though it had once been converted from a large stone animal-pen, but extra room had been added here and there until it was several stories high, with four or five chimneys that were perched on top of it's red roof, and so crooked that it looked as though it were held up entirely by Magic alone, or more-rather the Force in this case (_of which, Harry thought to himself, it probably was_).

As the trio approached the front entrance, Josh looked over at Molly curiously. "I meant to ask you about this "_little one_" as you put it, of whom you said that both you and your husband were looking out for when we all were in Dumbledore's office. Who is she, by the way?"

"Her name is Hermione," Molly answered him while reaching for the knob and turning it slightly to open-up the door of her residence. And upon all three people stepping inside the dwelling, she promptly continued. "She's absolutely the most precious and adorable little thing. Apart from my youngest, Ginny, of course. And we've had her in our care for a good many years now-"

Josh immediately cut her off, as he all of sudden appeared to be both surprised and confused by what she had just told him. "Wait, what?" he asked, turning sharply to look at her. "What'd you say her name was again?"

Molly turned her head to look directly at him. "Hermione, dear," she reaffirmed clearly. "Her name… is _Hermione Granger_."

Varner looked downwards at nothing in particular while in absolutely stunned disbelief, as he couldn't presume that what he had just now heard was at all correct. _It couldn't possibly be the same Hermione that he saved from nearly dying, along with her family, ten years earlier… could it?_

"No, it can't be. That can't be true," he murmured to himself, though it was just barely loud enough for both Harry and Molly to hear him. "That's impossible!"

"What are you talking about?" asked Molly confused.

Josh started explaining to her about the night in question that he saved a family of three from perishing in a fire due to a large burning tree trunk which had collapsed directly onto the side-road that their vehicle was traveling along, thus blocking their immediate path and effectively trapping them, as the smoke from the flames was incredibly thick and dense and they were unable to breathe. He told Molly that even though he was completely unaware of what the family's name was at the time, he'd saved the infant girl, Hermione, from nearly dying of smoke inhalation, of which he was familiar with her name due to hearing her mother yell it aloud in distress, as she couldn't get the infant to respond. He also said that her father was incredibly rude, nasty, and a completely, ungratefully irritable scumbag in Varner's opinion of the man, because of the way he acted towards Josh, as well as how he treated his own family after having just been saved by the young lad.

Molly simply nodded her head in response. "Well, I'm quite glad that you were around to save both her and her family, Josh. Though, I have to ask… were you also the one who healed-up her near fatal injuries while she was in a coma at a Muggle hospital, which she had sustained from the horrible car crash that killed her mother? There's something mentioned in her medical records about it which we obtained after both Arthur and I applied for full legal guardianship of her once she had been discharged from the hospital and subsequently released into the care of a Muggle orphanage located in Devon, but-"

Varner immediately looked at her in completely stunned silence, before opening his mouth to speak in the hushed manner of a near whisper. "_WHAT?!_"

Molly cocked her head slightly in confusion. "What? You didn't know about that?" she inquired bemusedly.

Josh shook his head in absolute dismay, both positively and clearly dumbfounded by this peculiar revelation.

"_WAAAAAAAHHH‼ __WAAAAAAAHHH‼ __WAAAAAAAHHH‼ __WAAAH! __WAAAH!_"

All of a sudden, a loud wail was clearly heard by everyone in the room, which apparently seemed to emanate from another area of the Weasley's home. The shrill crying in question sounded very much like that of a _very_ distressed and frightened little girl. Upon entering the kitchen area where the cries were in fact sounding from with Molly leading the two Jedi inside, both Harry and Josh noticed a playpen which was setup in the corner with a rather petite child sprouting long curled wavy brown hair sitting inside it, who had her small fists up to her face, and was bawling her little eyes out pitifully like a baby.

"Hey. Shhh. It's okay, little one. Shhh. There, there, now. It's alright," Molly softly cooed to the wee child, who was in turn holding her little arms up towards Weasley and clearly wanting to be held the moment she looked up at her guardian, as Molly easily lifted the poor little thing up out of the playpen and into her arms, gently positioning her on the woman's hip and lightly rocking her. "What's wrong? Huh? What's the matter?"

Upon turning around so that Josh and Harry could see the little one in Molly's arms better, Varner stepped forward slightly as the child briefly noticed him, before she buried her head into Molly's neck and started wailing much more intensely with outright terror.

"Is she okay?" Harry asked concerned, as Molly gently patted her on the back, trying to calm the child down.

"Oh, she's fine, dear. It's just that she always tends to get this way whenever she ether sees or merely hears the voice of someone new that she doesn't recognize," Molly stated, before turning around to check the status of what had been cooking in the oven.

Just then, a male voice sounded from the upstairs floor. "_Molly, dear, is that you I heard just now?_"

"Yes, Arthur. And there's someone here I'd like you all to meet," Molly called out as several loud footsteps could be heard coming hastily down the steps.

"_Who is it, Mummy?_" came a little girl's voice from the upper floor of the stairwell.

"Well, come on downstairs, Ginny, and see for yourself," Molly called to her daughter.

"_Okay!_" replied the little girl's voice quite happily. And a few moments later, several youths came flying down the stairs a bit hastily, all of them most eager to meet their guests.

Molly stepped forward at once, immediately blocking the kids' view of the two Jedi, as she was quite upset with them over what they had done just now. "What have I told you time and time again about running down the stairs like that, much less running in the house!?" she scolded them rather harshly as she pointed her finger while at the same time easily balancing Hermione on her hip.

All four of the children who were present immediately looked down at their feet rather shamefully for a minute, before turning their faces to look up at their mother again. "Sorry," they sincerely apologized together in unison, just as another _older_ boy came quietly down the steps, closely following along behind his father, Arthur Weasley.

Molly then casually intruded both Harry and Josh to each member of her family, before revealing the identities of the two Jedi directly to each one of them in turn. And the instant she said Harry's name, her little daughter, Ginny, started bounding up and down like mad with uncontainable elation and exuberance, as she was rather quite anxious to start asking "_The Boy Who Lived_" all kinds of questions.

"Perhaps while we eat, Ginny. Supper's nearly ready," remarked Arthur as he went into the kitchen, while everyone else in the Weasley household moved towards a large dining room after they had all washed-up. The dining room itself had a very long dining table, plus a few more than a dozen chairs or so that were evenly spaced around it, apparently due in part to the fact that the Weasley's had had frequent visitors, guests, and friends over at their place from time to time.

"Why don't you two join us," Molly expressed to both Harry and Josh kindly. "Make sure to wash-up first, though."

"Thank you," replied Harry graciously with a smile.

As the two guests then went to go and wash-up, Josh accidentally brushed up against Hermione as he was passing by Molly on his way to the restroom, and the little girl squealed with pure fright as she buried her face deep into Mrs. Weasley's shoulder and started crying anew all over again. But as Varner turned around to apologize, the young Jedi suddenly found himself standing in a completely different residence.

"_What are you talking about? That boy saved your life!_"

"_HE'S NOTHING MORE THAN A BLOODY FREAK!_"

Suddenly, Josh could hear two individuals arguing rather loudly with each other. And as he turned around, he saw both of the people which he had saved from perishing of smoke inhalation due to the burning tree trunk that had collapsed onto the side-road a decade prior: the Grangers. They were practically screaming at each other as their overly heated argument quickly escalated, which in turn caused a flurry of screaming and crying to promptly begin emanating from what sounded like to Varner to be an upstairs room.

Upon slowly making his way to what was the upstairs nursery, where the screams and cries were indeed coming from, Josh immediately noticed the same baby girl, Hermione, whom he had also saved from a near-death experience just ten years earlier along with her parents, thrashing about wildly in her crib against the far wall as he entered through the open doorway. When, all of a sudden, he then heard a loud shattering coming from downstairs which sounded like glass breaking as Hermione's mother momentarily shrieked in alarm.

"_DAMN THAT LITTLE BRAT TO HELL! SHE'S DONE IT AGAIN!_" Josh instantly heard the baby's father roar in quite an enraged tone of voice, before hearing rather loud and heavy footsteps running up the flight of stairs and into the nursery.

And as the young Jedi watched helplessly, completely unable to do anything in order to stop him, Hermione's father began slapping her across the face, making the baby scream and cry more and more, thus fueling her father's anger and rage even further. Just when the baby's mother tried to stop her husband from beating on their daughter, he rather violently pushed her out of the room, causing the woman to hit her head against the opposite wall and knocking her out for a short period of time.

"YOU'VE RUINED EVERYTHING‼" roared Granger over the squealing baby's deafening cries. "YOU'VE RUINED MY LIFE…MY CAREER…MY REPUTATION‼ YOU'RE SIMPLY A WORTHLESS…GOOD FOR NOTHING…DAMN LITTLE FREAK JUST LIKE _HIM_, YOU BITCH‼"

As Josh looked on in absolute horror, the vision promptly shifted to a time in which a few days had elapsed, and the Grangers were once more at each other's throats, with Mr. Granger once again beating-up on his wife and child, along with the obvious sign that he had been drinking heavily and that it was steadily becoming much more severe and chaotic. Plus his temper was growing more out of control over time as the Force Visions continued to play out in front of Varner's overwhelmingly rattled and disbelieving eyes.

One of the Force Visions in particular even unveiled an extraordinarily disconcerting secret truth about the Grangers themselves, as Josh quite blindsidedly discovered that little Hermione _was not_ actually their biological daughter at all, and that she had been unceremoniously left on their doorstep with only a brief note which read: "_Please look after our dear little Hermione for us!_" that had been quickly scribbled down on a piece of paper.

The last few of the Force Visions that Josh experienced were the worst yet, and he saw that one night a few years later in the Granger household, Mr. Granger had finally snapped and was just about to go over the edge, when his wife momentarily put a stop to his madness by clubbing him on the back of the head with a frying pan, thus knocking him senseless. But not before Granger had done something so appallingly inconceivable to little Hermione, that it almost made Josh feel sick to his stomach.

With another swirl of his vision, Josh found himself standing directly outside the Grangers home as Mrs. Granger ran out to her car in the dead of night while carrying her purse over her shoulder, as well as holding a toddler Hermione in her arms, and as she went around to one of the passenger-side doors of the vehicle that had the baby car-seat located on the far end, she managed to unlock the door and hastily open it, before strapping the little girl into her seat.

****_BANG!_****

Suddenly, a loud shot rang out as Mrs. Granger doubled over briefly, feeling a massively sharp pain in her side just as she managed to finish getting a very hysterical Hermione into her seat. And as she climbed into the driver seat, putting the vehicle into reverse and pulling out of the driveway, she could see her rather seemingly and disturbingly entranced husband steadily approaching with a coldly demented look in his eyes while brandishing a weapon.

Upon immediately throwing the vehicle into gear, Mrs. Granger stepped forcefully on the accelerator just as another shot rang out, and she fell over forward slightly in pain again as the bullet hit her square in the torso at an angle. But as she drove down the road, she began to feel dizzy and weak from loosing blood; she knew that she had to get to the hospital right away, as both the lives of her and her daughter were at risk now. And as she continued down the street, she could faintly hear the noise of sirens rapidly approaching in the distance from both behind as well as in front of her. _Damn that crazed psycho of a husband of hers! He must have called the police!_

As Josh was helplessly watching the whole scenario unfold before him, he failed to notice that Mr. Granger had mysteriously vanished almost immediately after the second gunshot was fired. And when his vision began to shift yet again, Varner found that he was now standing in the lobby of a very busy hospital.

Turning right around, he saw a group of doctors and nurses who were talking with one another concerning the arrival of a very young girl who was currently in the ER being prepped for surgery, as the vehicle she was in had collided head-on with a large pole and severally injured her to a near fatal degree; so much so that the collision both left _her_ with a _major_ TBI (_Traumatic Brain Injury_), and the vehicle's driver dead upon impact.

The description of the child in question sounded an awful lot like Hermione, and as the young Jedi Knight made his way there, he suddenly caught a quick glimpse of someone who looked like they were cloaked in dark-hooded robes.

Upon entering the operating room where the child was admitted, Varner could see that her little mangled body was hooked up to a vast array of life-support systems and medical equipment to keep her alive, as she was literally hanging onto her life by a mere thread. And as he could hear the distant footsteps of the doctors who were coming closer, Josh all of a suddenly realized that everything in the room had somehow halted to a standstill, as all of the machines had just…stopped; there digital display readings petrified in time.

Looking up, Josh instantly found himself standing face to face with a distantly familiar sight, and a chill ran down his spine. It was the exact same shadowy figure that he had encountered ten years ago on the same side-road where he had previously saved Hermione and her parents, and as the hooded and robed individual motioned ever slowly over next to the toddler's damaged and broken body that was so desperately clinging to whatever little amount of life remained, he gestured for the young Jedi to come closer.

Josh couldn't believe his eyes, as he stared despairingly at the horrific scene before him. Slowly gazing upward at the hooded figure, he shook his head in utter dismay. "_No!_"

"Look at her!" the figure whispered in absolute disgust. "This is all _your_ doing! She is this way solely because of _your_ failure! I told you_ NOT_ to save him!"

As the young Jedi stared down at the toddler in front of him once more, the hooded figure then slowly and gently ran his hand over every inch of her body, and as he did so, all of her external as well as internal wounds and injuries began to heal themselves. Within a few minutes, almost all of her near fatal and bodily impairments were fully mended.

Varner was completely stunned by what had just now taken place. Looking down at her tiny frame, there was positively _no_ indication that anything severely harmful or even remotely life-threatening had even happened to little Hermione whatsoever just by the mere sight of her. At least, that's what he initially thought when he used his powers to quickly examine her body, both inside and out. But when he examined her brain, he found something odd, as it appeared to not be fully functioning correctly.

Looking up at the hooded figure once more, Josh promptly leapt back in wide-eyed horror as the individual slowly removed his shroud to reveal… his own face underneath, staring right back at him.

"The mind isn't always so easily swayed to heal correctly," he remarked in a sternly low tone of voice. "Because of your impulsive blunder, she'll be trapped like this in a mentally infantile-state for the rest of her life, unable to care for herself in any way. And her rate of growth will also cease to function as a result of her traumatic brain injury as well."

As he continued to stair into the eyes of his counterpart, a wall of brilliantly white light steadily materialized in front of his sight, and the voice of his shadowy self spoke one last time. "_I warned you!_"

Snapping out of his visions, Josh immediately found himself still standing in the exact same spot in the Weasley's home that he had been only just a few moments ago. He noticed at once that everyone in the room was staring at him in utter confusion, and that little Hermione was still crying in Molly's arms, even though she seemed to have calmed down only a bit.

"Josh? Josh! Hey, are you alright?" asked Molly in a concerned tone of voice.

Looking directly at the toddler-sized ten-year-old girl in her arms in a wide-eyed stare of pure horror and as his breathing started getting heavier by the second, Varner turned away and ran for the front door of the Weasley's residence as huge tears began welling up in his eyes. _He couldn't allow anyone to see him like this._

As Josh bolted out of the house, a very concerned Molly decidedly handed Hermione over to her husband, who in turn started whispering gently into the little girl's ear and softly rubbing her back to continue trying to calm her down as she just kept whining and crying with sheer fright.

Stepping outside, Molly started searching around in the fields for Josh while loudly calling out to him.

"_AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH‼_"

All of a sudden, Molly could faintly hear a very unsettling scream of anguished guilt coming from but a short distance off over the sound of the wind blowing mildly across the fields. Carefully moving in the general direction of where the scream had originated, she soon found Josh in the middle of a wide-open expanse where a large portion of the field was simply little more than flat ground, as the young man was now sitting on his knees seemingly in defeat, and sobbing uncontrollably while muttering quietly to himself.

"_No, no, no, what have I done!? I'm so sorry!_"

Slowly walking around the young Jedi Knight until she was directly facing in front of him as he slowly glanced up at her with huge tears flowing down his cheeks, Molly knelt down leisurely to be right at eye-level with him as she promptly voiced her concern over his current state of distress.

"Josh, what's wrong?" she asked softly, much as a mother would asked her unhappy child what was bothering them. "Whatever's the matter, dear?"

Varner merely dropped his head shamefully and didn't answer her for a brief time. "It's just too horrible!" he finally uttered at last through his tears. "It's my fault! It's all my fault! I've been a fool!"

"Now get a hold of yourself, Josh! Whatever's happened has happened and can't be mended!" Molly declared sharply.

"But you don't get it!" Varner immediately protested. "It's about Hermione! The reason she's like that is because of what I did years ago!"

Molly didn't say a word, as she simply just pulled Josh gently into her arms to comfort him as he continued to weep tremendously with overwhelming guilt.

"_Oh, my - What have I done?_"

**_Twelve hours later … early the next morning._**

Josh slowly stirred awake, opening his eyes to let in the bright morning rays of sunlight as he found himself in a strange room, laying on a bed. _How in the world did he get here of all places?_

**_Knock, knock, knock._**

"Yeah? Come in," exclaimed Varner, as he slid into an upright sitting position on the bed.

An instant later, the bedroom door gently creaked open, and Mrs. Weasley casually stepped inside.

"Oh, good! You're up!" she expressed happily.

"Well, I'm awake at least," Josh replied a bit confused. "How'd I get here, anyways?"

Molly then explained to him that he must have exhausted himself so much to the point from crying, that he unexpectedly past out right there in her arms while they were outside in the fields the night before. And not sure what else to do, Molly simply used her Magic (_or rather the Force_) by levitating him upstairs with her wand and into a guest bedroom to sleep for the night.

Varner's face instantly blushed red with total embarrassment when he heard that. But Molly simply brushed the matter aside when she noticed his reaction.

"Oh, don't be so sheepish about it, dear. Why, you're hardly any older than my first son, Bill, no-less," she pointed out.

Josh sat staring blankly at the opposite wall for a moment or two before turning his head to look at her as he exhaled a sigh of gratitude. "Thanks," he expressed gratefully in an almost whisper-like tone of voice.

Molly just smiled in response. "Well, it's almost time for breakfast. Why don't you wash-up and come downstairs for something to eat."

Varner nodded at her in reply. "Okay. I'll be down in a minute."

As Mrs. Weasley turned to exit the bedroom, gently shutting the door closed behind her, Josh sat in deep thought for awhile. _How could he have been so pathetically dumb and stupid? If only he had simply let Hermione's 'adoptive' father die that night, then she wouldn't be in the terrible predicament that she currently was in right now, and none of this would have played out at all in the way that it had done so._

While sitting there alone, thinking about all of the mistakes that he had made which resulted in Hermione ending up in the way that she was, due to her adoptive father's brutal mistreatment and abuse towards her, he began to hate what the schmuck of a bastard that man had become. And as such, he slowly came to realize that it was all because of him and what he did wrong that made everything transpire in the way that it did.

Clenching his fist relatively tightly in anger, and thus causing each of the knuckles on his left hand to crack sharply upon doing so, Josh also hated the fact that he had so foolishly ignored the warnings about Hermione's adoptive father all those years ago. But he also began to hate the one person that was most responsible for allowing this inevitable set of circumstances to occur in the first place; the one person who had allowed this rather preventable and most certainly avoidable tragedy to unfold.

In that very moment… he hated himself.


	5. Ch 4 - Arcane Antiquities (Year 1)

Author's Note: This chapter is now up and ready to view. Let me know of any writing errors in it, and what I can do to make it better since it may seem a bit boring perhaps. And also, sorry that it's taking so long to get to the main part of the fanfiction (_which is to say - Harry's time at Hogwarts_).

* * *

**Chapter 4**

**Arcane ****Antiquities**

**Year 1 - ****Leaky Cauldron/Diagon Alley**** \- Earth**

Upon stepping outside the bedroom door, Josh found himself standing in a rather long hallway with several other rooms lining it and their doorways which were evenly facing the blank wall spaces in between each one of the rooms along the two opposite walls.

As the young Jedi casually made his way through the lengthy corridor, he could clearly hear Mrs. Weasley in one of the rooms just up ahead who was apparently talking to someone in what sounded like a very childish voice, as well as what sounded like a _very_ young child laughing happily. And when he approached the room that she was currently in at the moment, he turned into the open doorway to find the redhead standing over little Hermione, who in turn was lying buck naked on a changing table in what was apparently a nursery, babbling incoherently while also giggling at times and making cheerful babyish noises as well as playfully kicking her little legs, which for all intents and purposes was exactly what she was: a baby, both mentally and emotionally. But also physically to a certain degree too; as her body was essentially the same exact size and weight as that of a rather dinky two or three-year-old toddler, due in part because of the absence of growth hormones inside her cells that stemmed from the lasting effects of her nearly fatal traumatic brain injury which she had sustained as a result of the horrific car accident a decade prior, even though she was chronologically just ten years old.

Molly promptly turned her head to glance over to her right in the immediate direction of the open doorway to find Josh standing underneath the door-frame, with his arms gently folded across his chest and leaning up against the frame, when she heard someone approaching.

"Oh. Hi, Josh!" she expressed in delight with a heartwarming smile towards him. "I'm just getting Hermione changed and ready to come downstairs for breakfast."

"Hey!" the young Jedi Knight acknowledged back at her in a low tone of voice as he returned the look, although it was more of a worried smile than a cheerful one. And Molly must have immediately noticed that, because as she was just finishing up with changing Hermione into a new clean diaper (_or "nappy" as she called it_), her countenance shifted into one of concern for the youthful lad.

"Alright, Josh, what's wrong?" she sighed with a hint of unease in her voice towards Varner.

Josh promptly shook his head with sheer repudiation over the appalling things he had witnessed Granger doing to little Hermione in the Force Visions. He was _especially_ revolted and quite frankly pissed-off at the one singular act of barbarity that that heartless monster had inflicted upon the helpless and innocent little cherub.

He then exhaled a light sigh of uneasiness. "I don't know. I just - I still cannot get over what that bastard did to her!" the young Jedi Knight muttered out in a slightly hushed yet blunt manner, before looking up at a momentarily stunned Molly Weasley. "Ah, pardon the language. _Sorry._"

"What exactly did he do to her?" she asked in a slightly rigid tone after nodding in acceptance of his apology for cussing.

Varner steadily walked over towards Hermione and stopped only a couple feet away from her, so as not to alarm the little one and thus cause her to start crying, as he suspected that she still wasn't used to him being around her just yet. And as he pointed his finger at her torso area, a small section of tissue and skin in the middle of her abdomen some inches just above her bellybutton, from where it looked like the scaring of a now barely visible flesh wound of some sort which hadn't fully healed over, instantly started to darken in color, thereby revealing what at first appeared to be a fairly large and rather swollen bruise which to Weasley looked very much like it was in the shape of an alphabetical letter or something. Until, after examining the supposed bruise more carefully for a short period of time, did Molly all of a sudden realize to her apparent horror that the '_bruise_' was in fact a burn-mark which was visibly in the shape of a letter "**W**".

"Oh…please, no!" Molly uttered quietly with despair as tears came to her eyes and she shook her head in complete shock and rebuttal.

Josh slowly nodded his head in absolute confirmation of the sickening truth which she now understood. "Unfortunately, yes… I'm afraid so. He did indeed brand her. And I don't need to tell you what that _W_-shaped burn-mark on her body stands for ether," the young man firmly stated in a jarring tone of outright disgust. And upon letting his hand fall back down to his side, the darkened burn-mark on Hermione's abdomen faded until it was once again hardly visible to the naked eye.

Upon finally learning the revolting truth of what the mark on Hermione's body actually was, after first noticing it as nothing more than an oddly-shaped minor distortion on her tummy several years earlier, so very soon after both her and Arthur had taken the adorable little munchkin home with them once they were formally granted legal and permanent guardianship of the baby, Molly promptly lifted Hermione up off the changing table and into her loving arms, gently cradling her quite rather protectively against her chest in a very firm embrace while tenderly rubbing her back, with the little girl's head resting comfortably against Weasley's shoulder as the tiny tot began sucking on her thumb.

A few minutes later, as everyone was heading into the dining area, there was a rather unexpectedly light knock at the front door.

Harry had asked Molly why Hermione wasn't fully dressed and only wearing a nappy when he noticed them coming down the stairs. And Molly stated that it was much easier to clean her up after she ate, thus sparing her the grief of having to constantly wash Hermione's clothes whenever she was being fed, since there was more often than not a bit of a mess being made from time to time as a result of the little tyke's eating habits.

"I've got it!" exclaimed Ginny over her shoulder as she quickly approached the door and turned the knob immediately after hearing the noise; practically throwing it open to surprisingly find three blonde-haired individuals standing just outside their residence on the front stoop. Or rather, one white-haired male and two blonde-haired females, to be precise.

"Hi, Ginny!" the little girl with curly blonde-haired exclaimed gleefully with a large and bright smile on her face.

"LUNA!" the small redhead virtually squealed with utter delight the instant she saw the child and promptly threw herself forward as the two youngsters hugged each other tightly.

Molly walked over towards the front door of the house while carrying Hermione on her hip, curious to see who it was that had unexpectedly come by for a visit.

"Hello, Molly!" the blonde woman politely yet warmly expressed. "We apologize for dropping in like this, but-"

"Dory!" exclaimed Mrs. Weasley in an astonished yet seemingly thrilled tone of voice upon her immediately recognizing all three of the familiar faces. "No, please, come in! We were all just about to sit down for breakfast. I must say that this is really quite a surprise and a pleasure. Why don't you three come sit down and join us. We'd be absolutely overjoyed to have you all here with us this morning!"

"Thank you, Molly!" Dory replied graciously, and the three individuals casually walked into the house as Harry and Josh both approached them.

"Harry Potter!" the man with white hair exclaimed in astonishment the minute he saw the little boy walking towards him and his family. "It's certainly a real pleasure to finally meet you at last! My name is Xenophilius Lovegood, but please call me Xeno. This is my wife, Pandora. And this is our daughter, Luna."

"Nice to meet you, sir," replied Harry with a smile as he shook Mr. Lovegood's hand.

"Hello, Harry," said Dory as she went to shake young Potter's hand. But just as she did so, Harry all of a sudden found himself standing in an entirely different room from any other that was currently within the Weasley's home at the Burrow.

As he turned around, Harry immediately saw Mrs. Lovegood doing something with her wand, when a strange light suddenly began to emanate from the tip and rapidly expand outwardly in size.

****BOOM!****

The light of which was being conjured from the tip of her wand suddenly and without any kind of warning instantaneously exploded violently in all directions as the witch screamed out in both shock and pain. A moment later, Harry could see her lifeless body on the floor laying several feet away from where she had previously stood just seconds ago.

"_Mummy!_"

Potter immediately spun on his heels to find Luna standing just outside of the room only but a few yards away from where her mother's lifeless body now rested. The little girl immediately ran to her mother's body and started crying with absolute sadness and anguish upon her realizing that her mother wasn't getting up.

"Mummy, no! Come back! COME BACK! MUMMY!"

Xenophilius immediately came rushing into the room looking quite stunned and confused the moment he heard his daughter crying out for her mother.

"What's going on here? Sweetheart, what happened?"

"_Harry? Harry! Are you okay?_" asked Josh as the vision subsided from the little boy's eyes and he found himself standing once again inside the Weasley's house at the Burrow.

As he looked around at everyone, who were in turn staring at him in bewilderment, Harry turned his head to face Pandora directly with a very concerned expression in his eyes.

"I - I just… had a vision," he immediately explained.

"A vision? Of what, Harry?" Varner inquired with an ever slightly puzzled look on his face.

The little boy immediately stared Mrs. Lovegood dead in the face with sheer worry concerning her safety. "Of you," he stated at once without hesitating. "_I saw you die!_"

Upon hearing that, nearly everyone in the room looked at one another with utter shock as well as a deep sense of concern for the safety and well-being of not just Dory, but the whole Lovegood family entirely. And a short time later, while everyone was sitting around the Weasley's dining table eating their breakfasts, with Luna helping to feed little Hermione who was plopped down in a high chair, Harry began telling the present company in minute detail (_though mainly the Lovegoods themselves in general_) about what exactly he saw in his vision through the Force.

"Well then, I think that you should not go round experimenting with anymore spells in the near future, luv," Xeno quite strongly insisted to his wife after Harry had finished describing what he saw in his vision.

Dory nodded her head in full agreement on the matter. "After what you've just now told us, Harry, I'm surely not going to try doing anything more with spells ever again if that's what ends of happening to me!" she remarked in a stern tone of voice.

"Better to be safe than sorry, I should think," Josh added quite frankly.

Virtually everyone around the dining table, excluding Hermione obviously, immediately nodded in agreement with young Jedi Knight's comment.

After breakfast was finished and the dishes were then washed and put away, as well as Hermione being cleaned up and then put into a cute little pink footed onesie with baby animals all over it since the tiny runt had made a slight mess of herself just as Molly had said would most likely happen, Harry, Josh, the Weasleys, and the Lovegoods all traveled to a secret location known as Diagon Alley which was accessible through a magical barrier that was disguised as a large brick wall behind the Leaky Cauldron inn.

Josh had gotten everyone to the hidden passageway which in turn lead directly to the inn by having them all stand side by side in a straight line together and then grab hold of each other's hands or arms tightly, and upon levitating himself gently into the air off the ground once the group was outside of the Burrow, casually flew both himself and company a short distance up into the sky and headed straight for London.

Almost everyone in their small party thought it was kinda exciting to be able to fly through the lower skies without the use of broomsticks, even though it was really just Varner utilizing his powers to effectively lift them all up off the ground and carry them to their destination. Yet Hermione on the other hand was full-on terrified of the whole experience, as she continuously screamed and cried quite loudly the whole way to the city in Molly's arms, even though Mrs. Weasley had put a pacifier (_or rather a "dummy"_) into her mouth that she had retrieved from inside the diaper bag which she brought along with her in order to lessen the noise before the group took to the skies.

The group apart from Harry and Josh thought at first that they would probably end-up getting spotted by everyone else on the streets down below them due to Hermione being completely hysterical, but both of the Jedi had that totally covered. Working together, Varner and Potter used the Force (_along with Josh utilizing his superpowers_) to visually and audibly hide their presence from any and all detection. And by the time that Harry, Josh, and the others had all reached the passageway to the Leaky Cauldron, the little squirt was out like a light while resting her head on Molly's shoulder and sucking on her dummy.

Upon entering the inn, Harry immediately looked around the barroom and within seconds he found Hagrid sitting alone at one of the tables a few yards away. Smiling cheerfully, he dashed over at once to where the half-giant was seated.

"Well… hey, Harry!" exclaimed Hagrid the moment he turned his head in the little boy's direction. "Are you ready to go get your school supplies that you'll need for this year?"

"Yeah! I sure am!" said Harry as he nodded excitedly.

Hagrid then stood up from his chair and the whole lot of them instantly strode over to a big metal door that in turn lead into a small enclosed area where the barrier wall which guarded the entrance into Diagon Alley was located.

Upon taking out his umbrella from inside his coat, the half-giant tapped the tip of it once each against three different bricks and a moment later the center of the wall began separate into two walls, and then two columns, as each one of the bricks slid back again and again, until finally the widening space grew into a huge archway that big enough for someone who was the same exact size as Hagrid to step through without a second thought. And beyond the archway lay a cobbled street that twisted and turned this way and that out of sight.

"Welcome, Harry, to Diagon Alley," said Hagrid, and he grinned at Harry's amazement as everyone in the small group immediately stepped through the archway.

Harry and Ron both looked at each other with unbridled excitement. Ron had always heard many, many stories about Diagon Alley from his older brothers, but had never actually seen nor set foot there himself before. Yet on this day, he was finally here at last. And the sight before his eyes was far more spectacular and wondrous than he had ever imagined or even perceived.

Ginny and Luna were both bounding up and down with uncontrollable excitement, as they were desperately wanting to visit each and every one of the shops, though primarily just the candy and sweets shop as well as the ice cream parlour that were also there.

"So, um, Hagrid, where's this Gringotts at anyway? Professor McGonagall said that it was a Wizarding Bank, I think?" Harry surmised.

The half-giant nodded. "Right you are, Harry. Gringotts is most indeed a wizard bank," he remarked as the two of them casually walked through the street side by side together after the Weasleys broke off from the group to go and purchase all of the necessary school supplies that Ronald would need for his first year at Hogwarts, with the Lovegoods following suit a few moments later to take their daughter Luna as well as Ginny Weasley over to the candy shop to buy sweets.

Josh, meanwhile, spent his time glancing around at the many different little shops that were strewn about up and down the place along both sides of the street as he casually walked along several paces directly behind Hagrid and Harry. He wasn't entirely sure why, but he could feel something strange through the Force that seemed to be whispering out in a jumble of hushed voices, as if something was here that was rather quite out of place, almost like it didn't belong anywhere near this area at all. Potter must have felt it too, for he immediately heard Hagrid talking to the little boy in a confused manner, and Harry promptly told the half-giant that something wasn't quite right in one of the shops, and asked if he could take a quick look at what appeared to be a used book store a few yards away from where they stood.

"I suppose that's all right, Harry," muttered Hagrid, a bit puzzled at the child's request. "But we gotta get you're money first before you can buy anything."

Harry nodded understandably in reply, and the three individuals made their way to a multilevel snowy-white building that towered over the other little shops. And standing beside it's burnished bronze doors, wearing a uniform of scarlet and gold was…

"Um, Hagrid, what is that?" asked Harry in low whisper, gesturing at the strange creature as the trio approached.

"Yeah, that's a Goblin," Hagrid answered quietly as they walked up the white stone steps towards him. "Clever as they come, Goblins, but not the most friendly of beasts. Best stay close to me."

The Goblin in question was about a head shorter than Harry was. He had a swarthy clever face, a pointed beard, and Harry noticed very long fingers and feet. He bowed as the doors slowly creaked open, and upon stepping inside, they were immediately facing a second pair of doors; silver this time, with large words engraved upon them.

_"__ENTER, STRANGER, BUT TAKE HEED OF WHAT AWAITS THE SIN OF GREED, FOR THOSE WHO TAKE BUT DO NOT EARN MUST PAY MOST DEARLY IN THEIR TURN! SO  
__IF YOU SEEK BENEATH OUR FLOORS A TREASURE THAT WAS NEVER YOURS, THIEF, YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED! BEWARE OF FINDING MORE THAN TREASURE THERE!__"_

Harry glanced up at the half-giant curiously after reading what was etched in very large all-capital lettering across the two doors.

"Gringotts is the safest place in the world to keep anything you be wanton to protect from thieves, bandits, and other such bloke," said Hagrid, looking down at Potter sincerely. "Except for maybe Hogwarts, of course. You'd be mad to try and rob it. Never mess with Goblins, Harry. Or you'll be sorry that you did."

The little boy nodded affirmatively in reply. _He wouldn't think of even wanting to steal from a bank or from anybody else for that matter. There'd be absolutely no point or no reason to do such a thing, including the fact that it was morally wrong anyways. And it would most certainly go against everything that both Sirius and the Jedi Order had taught him as well._

A pair of Goblins, one standing on either side of the two silver doors, bowed as they walked through the opened entryway into a vast marble hall. About a hundred or so more Goblins were sitting on high stools behind a long counter, scribbling in large ledgers, weighing coins in brass scales, examining precious stones through eyeglasses. There were too many doors to count leading off the hall, and yet more Goblins were showing people in and out of these.

The trio made for the front counter up at far end of the hall just as the Goblin who was working there looked up as Hagrid approached.

"Morning," said Hagrid to a free Goblin. "We've come to take some money outta Mr. Harry Potter's safe."

"And does Mr. Harry Potter have his key?" inquired the Goblin with a rather grim stare over-top the counter at the little boy below him.

"I got it here…somewhere," said Hagrid as he began to empty the contents of his pockets onto the counter, thus scattering a handful of moldy dog biscuits over the Goblin's book of numbers. And the Goblin promptly wrinkled his nose at the foul sight of the rotten dog food. Harry, meanwhile, watched another Goblin off to the right of him who was weighing a pile of various-sized rubies as big as glowing coals.

Josh immediately stepped up beside the half-giant and lightly tapped him on the shoulder, who turned to glance over at the young man.

"Ah, no offense, big guy…" the Jedi Knight remarked softly as Hagrid continued to empty out his pockets, "…but you probably should toss out those old dog biscuits asap. I seriously don't think that the Goblins here would appreciate you messing up their work-space with molding pet treats very much."

Hagrid nodded his head reluctantly in agreement, before finally retrieving what he had been searching around inside his coat for. "Ah, got it!" he said at last, promptly holding up a tiny golden key and placing it on the counter in front of the Goblin.

"That seems to be in order," said the Goblin after examining it closely.

"Oh, and there's something else as well," whispered Hagrid importantly, throwing out his chest. Harry couldn't tell what it was that he was saying as the half-giant continued. "I've got a letter here from Professor Dumbledore. It's about you know what in vault you know which."

As Hagrid pulled out the letter in question and handed it over, the Goblin opened it and then read it carefully. "Very well," he said, handing it back to Hagrid. "I will have someone take you down to both of the vaults. _Griphook!_"

Griphook was yet another Goblin who in turn lead both Hagrid and Harry towards one of the many doors that was off the hall, but only after Hagrid had gathered up the moldy rotten treats and then dumped them into a nearby trash bin (or "rubbish bin") as they sometimes called it in England.

Josh, on the other hand, exited the bank and stepped back out onto Diagon Alley's cobbled street since he had no business to attend to concerning Gringotts and because he wasn't a wizard either, even though both witches and wizards alike did use the Force themselves, but they were not Jedi and they only knew the Force to merely be a form of Magic as they perceived it so. As he steadily went down the road, he could faintly hear the whispering voices again, which seemed to be coming from the small book store just a few yards away. Upon entering the store, the Jedi found the majority of the Weasley family (_minus Ginny who went off with the Lovegoods to get candy and ice cream, as well as the two oldest Weasley boys who currently weren't present_) searching through the books along one of the corner shelves. He could hear the voices gradually getting louder and louder with every small step that he took towards the very back of the shop.

Several minutes later, the door opened at the front of the shop and both Harry and Hagrid walked inside as the Weasleys turned to see them enter. Potter cheerfully acknowledged Ron who smiled back at him before young Harry quickly strode directly over to where Varner now stood at the back of the store. And as both of the little boys walked over towards where the Jedi Knight was standing, given that the redhead was now very curious to know what Harry was up to, all three individuals stared at what appeared to be some kind of large tome-shaped mechanism with odd markings etched across it's surface that rested on top of an even larger semi-slanted wooden book stand which was positioned up against the back wall.

"What is that?" asked Ron while confusingly scratching his head.

Harry and Josh both shook their heads in utter bewilderment. "I don't know, Ron," Harry responded, sounding even more baffled than his friend. "I really don't know."

"Ah, I see that you've discovered the "_Cryptic Contraption_" like so many before you have done. Myself included, of course," said the shopkeeper as he casually approached the trio from behind the open doorway of a rather thin door-frame that lead into a teeny tiny back office that seemed far too narrow for even the leanest adult male human to squeeze through. He was an abnormally cadaverous-looking fellow, with limbs that appeared quite disjointed and misshapen, as if his whole entire body had been crafted out of countless giant-sized popsicle sticks that were seemingly pasted together with a hot glue gun.

"Discovered what exactly, sir?" inquired Harry, still rather perplexed over whatever this thing was that seemed to be calling them here to this location. "What is this thing?"

"It's what I like to call the Cryptic Contraption," the shopkeeper reiterated. "No one knows what it is exactly or why it's even here. It's said that shortly before this shop first opened it's doors for business, a mysterious figure was reportedly seen walking through Diagon Alley late one night and broke into the place. But instead of stealing anything from within the shop, he promptly strode over to the back area; to this very spot, and placed the object here on this large book stand which was supposedly meant to be used for a different artifact entirely that was to be kept securely enclosed in an unbreakable glass case."

"What happened to this…mysterious person who broke-in here?" Ron asked.

"He vanished, never to be seen nor heard from again," the shopkeeper answered.

Harry all of sudden heard the voices talking again in a hushed whisper as he turned to stare at the mechanism once more. And this time, he could clearly make out what it was that they were saying. "Use the Force… _use the Force. _Use the Force… _use the Force._"

Upon moving his hand slightly over the mechanism, Harry did as the voices instructed him to do, and used the Force to unlock the device. As he did so, several small latches along the center of the mechanism, each facing inward, simultaneously unlatched themselves and the center of the device began to open up and then unfold back into itself at both ends as tiny gears slowly pulled back the flaps of the container and away from the middle, until the device was virtually flat at both ends. What lay inside it was a large shabby-looking tome with a _VERY_ familiar symbol imprinted on the cover.

"I don't believe it," Josh murmured in absolute surprise and awe at what he was looking at.

Everyone there slowly huddled around the trio; all of them interested to know what it was that they had found to be inside the mechanism which was in fact some kind of a highly complex safe.

"Is that a book, Harry? What's that symbol in the middle there?" Ron asked his friend curiously.

Harry nodded his head in response to the first question. "Yes, Ron. It is," he answered, before turning to face the small huddled group of people around him. "And it's a very old book at that. But I also know what that symbol is too."

"What?" asked Ron. He promptly looked up at Josh who immediately spoke.

"It's the symbol… of the Jedi Order," the young man revealed with an unsettling tone in his voice.


	6. Ch 5 - Buying School Supplies (Year 1)

Author's Note: This chapter is now up and ready to read at last. Hope you enjoy. Let me know of any writing errors.

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**Chapter 5**

**Buying School Supplies**

**Year 1 - ****Leaky Cauldron/Diagon Alley**** \- Earth**

Upon stepping outside the entrance to the second-hand bookshop and back onto Diagon Alley's cobbled street, the group stood blinking in the bright rays of sunlight and Harry immediately glanced up at the half-giant as he was curiously wondering where they should go to next now that he had a bag full of bronze, silver, and gold coins on his person that were needed in order to purchase all of the necessary books and supplies which were listed on the piece of parchment that had come with his acceptance letter to Hogwarts.

"Might as well get your uniform," said Hagrid, nodding to a nearby shop with the name of "_Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasions_" engraved above the window and door frames. He then looked down at the little boy promptly. "Listen, Harry, would you mind terribly if I slipped off for a pick-me-up at the Leaky Cauldron? I hate them Gringotts carts."

Harry shook his head. "Not at all," he obliged the half-giant graciously. "Josh and I will go and get my uniform, and then we'll head to the other necessary shops to buy the rest of my things. We can meet-up again later over at the wand shop."

"Over at Ollivanders?" Hagrid asked, pointing towards the shop in question, and Harry nodded in response. "All right, then. I'll meet you there in an hour or so. See ya later, Harry!" He then nodded in compliance before striding off back towards the barrier which separated Diagon Alley from the Leaky Cauldron.

As both Harry and Josh entered the robes shop to purchase the little boy's uniform, they were greeted by non-other than the shopkeeper, Madam Malkin, herself. She was a squat smiling witch dressed all in mauve.

"Hogwarts, dear?" she asked before Harry could even utter a word. "Got the lot here. What do you need? I'm sure we have your size."

While being lead towards the back of the shop to pick out his robes that he needed for school, young Potter immediately thought of something of the upmost importance. _He currently didn't have any extra sets of clothing or footwear with him for everyday use at the moment. He only had his Jedi tunic, robes, and boots with him of which he was presently wearing. And it wouldn't do him any good to be going around bare naked while his one and only set of clothes were being cleaned and pressed whenever they became grungy and/or whenever he took a bath to get clean himself, even though he was starting to get a little old for taking baths over simply showering. Maybe there was a regular clothing store somewhere in Diagon Alley that was nearby, or perhaps he could even ask Mrs. Weasley herself to lend him a few sets of Ron's clothes if there were any extras to spare._

As Madame Malkin was fitting him up for just the right set of school robes, Harry turned is head slightly to look at her. "Excuse me," he said while being measured, "Is there a regular clothing shop within Diagon Alley where I can purchase some new extra sets of casual clothes?"

Madame Malkin shook her head. "Sorry, dear," she replied regrettably. "But I'm afraid that my shop is the only one in Diagon Alley that sells robes. And _only_ robes, at that."

Harry nodded understandably, but deep down he was wondering just how he was going to be able to buy the extra clothes which he needed. He didn't have any other form of money with him at the moment other than the large bag of coins from Gringotts, and he was sure that no clothing shops in London would except that type of currency.

A few minutes later, Potter hopped down off of the footstool once Malkin was done with fitting him into his new school robes. Then he exited the shop after paying for both his uniform as well as the other two sets of robes and accessories that were written on the items list, before graciously thanking the shopkeeper for her help. Upon meeting Josh right outside the door, who had in fact briefly left the shop and walked back to the Leaky Cauldron to talk with Hagrid for a moment, the two of them strode over to a store called "_Flourish and Blotts_" to purchase Harry's schoolbooks.

While inside the bookshop, Harry saw books upon books that were stacked high; all the way up to the ceiling both on various shelves and on the floor too, with many differing sizes and shapes to them. He searched through the many shelves and stacks that were exactly his height, with Varner in turn searching each and every one of the stacks of books and shelves on his level, while also remembering to place them back in the exact same spot they were in after carefully yet swiftly flipping through each of them, as well as quickly searching the ones piled-up nearest to the ceiling simply by levitating himself off the ground, and albeit with such incredibly inhuman speed that all Harry could make out was a _very_ faint blur of motion zigzagging this way and that throughout the shop. A minute or so later, Harry had all of the schoolbooks that he required for his very first term of the year.

While walking over to another shop to buy parchment, quills, and bottles of ink, Harry glanced up at Josh momentarily.

"Josh, I was wondering, why did you go off to meet with Hagrid earlier?" he inquired.

"I wanted to make sure the Jedi text that we found in the second-hand bookstore was well-protected for the time-being, given it's age and rough condition," answered Josh. "So I gave it to him for safekeeping until we could figure out what to do next since both you and I are probably gonna be here for awhile. Well, that, as well as how and when you're supposed to leave for Hogwarts."

The little boy nodded as the two of them stepped through the front door to "_Scribbulus Writing Implements_" where Harry found his standard writing quills, self-writing quills, and quills that danced, did somersaults, back-flips, cartwheels, and just generally frolicked about when they weren't being used. And all someone need do was tickle their feather and the quill would immediately hop back into their ink bottle so that the person could begin using it to write with, once they promptly cleaned up the small mess of splotched ink that the dancing quill had obviously made, of course. Potter also found a bottle of ink which changed color as one wrote with it.

Afterwards, they briefly visited "_Mr. Mulpepper's Apothecary_" (_immediately after stopping by "Potage's Cauldron Shop" to purchase the Potions equipment_) to get Harry's needed supply of basic potion ingredients, which to him seemed just barely fascinating enough to make up for it's horribly revolting smell; a putrid mixture of rotten eggs and cabbages, as well as many other foul odors and horrid stenches that almost certainly would have made even Josh's stomach lurch had they stayed in there any longer than was necessary.

"Whew, boy! Ah, somebody _really_ needs to put an air freshener in there!" the Jedi Knight loudly expressed the moment both he and Harry stepped out the front door of the shop.

Potter merely nodded in response, as he was looking a bit peaked after just having come out of the shop. Suddenly, the door to the shop swung wide-open once more and a rush of nauseous and intoxicating fumes blew past Harry as someone reluctantly stepped inside, thus causing the little boy to hastily make an indirect beeline for the nearest rubbish bin and promptly spew the contents of his stomach into it.

"_Oy gevalt!_" Josh muttered with a heavy sigh to himself in a tone of semi-annoyance as he rolled his eyes. "_Well, there goes his breakfast! Great!_"

Just then, Hagrid came walking up the street towards the young Jedi Knight while looking a bit befuddled upon noticing Harry throwing up in the rubbish bin.

"Blimey! What's up with Harry?" he asked as Varner turned his head to look at him.

"It's the store behind us here," Josh stated, gesturing to the Apothecary. "That place is a literal health-hazard! When exactly was the last time the owners cleaned-up in there?"

"Never…as far as I know," said Hagrid bluntly. "It's always been like that ever since the shop first opened it's doors for business so many years ago."

Varner shook his head in disgust, wondering just how someone could operate a business under such appallingly unsanitary conditions like that. Harry then regained himself and walked back towards the two men, albeit a tad sluggishly.

"Are you alright there, Harry?" asked Hagrid.

Potter immediately shook his head. "Not really, Hagrid," he answered groggily. "And I _never_ want to go into that shop again. It's absolutely _disgusting_ in there."

Josh promptly took another glance at the items list again. "Well, the good news is that all's left to get now is your wand, Harry."

"Why don't you take him over to Ollivanders then," said Hagrid. "I just remembered I got something I need to do. Won't be long."

Varner briefly nodded in reply, and he rather softly as well as steadily gestured Harry towards the shop in question, which was found to be quite narrow and shabby when they stepped through the doorway. Peeling gold letters over the shop's door-frame read "_Ollivanders: Makers of Fine Wands since 382 B.C._" in all caps. A single wand lay on a faded purple cushion in the dusty windowsill, obviously meant for display to the outside. Elsewhere, a small tinkling bell rang out within the depths of the shop the very moment that they entered in order to signal they presence to the shop-owner.

"_Good morning,_" said a soft voice.

Harry glanced toward the back of the shop, but all he could see were thousand upon thousands of narrow rectangular-shaped boxes which were piled neatly all the way to the ceiling. Suddenly, a tall wooden ladder promptly slid along a set of shelves that were crammed full of boxes as an old man who was standing atop the upper steps glanced down with a knowing smile at the little boy; his wide pale eyes shining like moons through the gloom.

"Mr. Potter!" he exclaimed in sheer amazement. "It- It's really you! After all these years of not knowing where you'd gone, I was beginning to worry that you wouldn't show!"

The old man slowly stepped down from the ladder and casually wandered over to the front desk, stopping only momentarily to look directly at Varner in confusion.

"And who might you be?" he asked quite befuddled.

Josh slowly held out his hand to greet him. "My name is Joshua Varner," he stated. "I guess you could say I'm Harry's unofficial guardian and mentor in a sense."

The old man nodded as he shook Josh's hand, though still seemed a little perplexed. "Ollivander. Garrick Ollivander." He then turned his gaze toward Harry once more. "Well, then. Let's find out which wand is right for you, shall we?" He turned around to walk over to one of the many stacks of boxes, only to face Potter once more. "Actually, it's really the wand that chooses the wizard. Not the other way around, of course."

"You mean… the wand is alive?" Harry asked, even though he had been told an awful lot concerning the nature of wands from Sirius, he didn't want Ollivander or anyone else to know just yet about his godfather taking care of him for all those years, apart from Hagrid of whom the little boy felt he could trust to keep it a secret for now. Until the exact time was right for the rest of the Wizarding World to know, that is.

Ollivander nodded thoughtfully. "Mmm…I suppose you could say that in a certain way, yes. The wand is alive. After all, it does possess a kind of will and intent about it in order to choose with whom it's allegiance lies."

Potter nodded and Ollivander turned around to retrieve a dusty old box from within the stack that sat on a left-hand shelf. And upon taking out the wand from inside it, he then carefully presented it to the raven-haired youth.

"Try this one. Beechwood and dragon heartstring," he said. "Nine inches. Nice and flexible."

Harry politely took it from Ollivander, but for an instant was unsure of what to do until he pointed it at something randomly in the shop, and the next thing anyone knew, a wall-mounted bull's skull and bones dislodged themselves from their plaque and started doing a two-step line dance before collapsing motionless onto the floor again.

"Apparently not," remarked Ollivander in a very "_matter of factly_" tone of voice.

Harry carefully placed the wand on the desk in front of himself, before turning his attention to Josh who in turn was looking rather bewildered at the moment.

"What is it?" he asked the older Jedi.

Varner merely stared off in the distance at nothing for a brief moment while sporting a peculiar expression on his face. "_Dancing buffalo bones,_" he voiced primarily to himself rather than to Harry, before finally coming to a conclusion after thinking it over a bit while shaking his head. "_Nah!_"

Ollivander then went to fetch another box off the same shelf and extracted the wand from inside it, before returning to the front desk to give it to Harry for testing.

"Perhaps…this one," the shopkeeper assumed… wrongly. "Maple and phoenix feather. Seven inches. Quite whippy."

At the exact moment at which Potter had lightly flicked the wand in his hand towards the front window, Ronald and Arthur Weasley had come in through the shop's entrance. Harry instantly started chuckling quietly to himself, which was then followed by Josh, then Ollivander, and finally Arthur too.

Ron couldn't understand what was going on. "What is it, Harry?" he asked. And that just seemed to make the situation even more bizarre and awkward for him, because as soon as he said that, everyone in the shop instantly started laughing hysterically. Just at that instant, Molly and the twins came strolling into Ollivander's wand shop, and as soon as they noticed Ronald's appearance once they had stopped wondering what all the theatrics were about, they too broke-out into fits of laughter as well.

The youngest Weasley boy was slowly becoming very confused and uneasy by all of this, until he promptly turned his head and noticing his own reflection on a rounded glass object, saw for himself what it was that everyone was apparently laughing about.

"_Aaaaaaaaaahhhhh!_" he screamed in horror upon seeing the color of his hair, which was now a bright shade of rosy-pink. "Harry, what did you just do to my hair!? Change it back! CHANGE IT BACK!"

The laughter almost immediately died-down when little Hermione suddenly awoke from her nap and started crying rather heavily due to all the loud ruckus that was presently transpiring.

"Oh, I think we just woke the kid up, you guys!" Varner promptly declared over the laughter as well as Ron frantically running about the shop while flailing his arms in a sheer state of panic.

Just then, a young couple along with their son came into the shop who were mainly there to purchase a wand for the little boy's first year at Hogwarts, seeing as how he too was preparing for the start of the new term at the school, but also to find out what all of the commotion was about.

"Alice! Frank! What a pleasure to see you both again!" exclaimed Molly from the moment the three individuals stepped through the door. She then looked down at the little boy standing just in front of them. "Oh, and young Neville, of course! How are you, my dear?"

"Hi, Mrs. Weasley!" exclaimed the little boy cheerfully. "I'm doing well, thank you!"

"Molly, what's wrong with Ron's hair?" asked Alice rather curiously, once she noticed why Ronald was still panicking. "Why is it all… _pink?_"

"I'm afraid that was my fault," Harry answered almost instantly. "I was trying out a wand, and, well… you can see what the end result was that happened."

Alice nodded at the little boy in response, before turning her attention toward little Hermione who was still partially crying in Molly's arms. And upon offering to take the baby for awhile in order to give the redhead a break from holding her, who in turn obliged the offer even though Molly wasn't at all tired of holding the little one, she promptly walked out of Ollivanders and strode directly to the Leaky Cauldron, which had an upstairs lounge area with a fireplace in it that was located right above the barroom area where all of the guest rooms were spaced evenly along two separate hallways, after telling everyone inside the wand shop where she was headed off to.

Neville then turned toward Harry and introduced himself to the little boy. "I'm Neville by the way. Neville Longbottom."

Harry gladly shook his hand. "Harry. Harry Potter. Pleased to meet you, Neville."

Neville and Frank instantly stared at each other in total astonishment. The famous "_Boy Who Lived_" was standing not but a few inches in front of them and they could hardly believe it.

"Um, excuse me! I don't mean to be rude, but won't somebody _please_ change my hair back to normal already!?" Ron suddenly protested loudly in desperation after finally calming down a bit and ceasing his ravingly mad antics. "I look like a bloody freak!"

Josh shook his head while silently chuckling under his breath so as not to offend the Weasley boy and make him feel even more stupid than he already felt.

"Here. Let me get that," he said, and gently brushed his hand over Ron's head from front to back, thus restoring his hair color back to it's natural state, but also slightly messing-up his combed hair in the process. And upon doing so, everyone who was present in the shop (_apart from Harry_) looked both at Varner as well as at one another with rather astonished expressions on their faces.

"How did you do that?" Neville asked in astonishment at what he had just seen Varner do. "Are you a wizard?"

Josh shook his head. "Nope. Afraid not. But I do possess superhuman-like abilities, though." He then held out his hand to greet the little boy. "I'm Josh. Joshua Varner."

As Neville reached forward and shook the young Jedi Knight's hand, Varner suddenly found himself mysteriously hovering off the ground in the air and was now smack-dab in the middle of the ocean during a colossally monstrous thunderstorm in the middle of the night.

The wind and waves pelted him furiously from each and every angle as Josh quickly looked around at his immediate surroundings, trying to figure out where he was and just what the hell was going on. All of a sudden, he could hear the sounds of distant screams and cries for help as he turned to see what looked like several old-style lifeboats with people in them who were trying desperately to battle the harsh conditions of the storm as they paddled their way towards safety. An instant later, one of the lifeboats tragically vanished beneath the waves and Josh could clearly make out the anguished screams and shrill cries of a woman's voice calling-out someone's name.

"_CORVUS__‼_"


	7. Ch 6 - Assault in the Streets (Year 1)

Author's Note: This chapter is now finally up and ready to view. Let me know of any writing errors that are in it. Also, the next chapter will be seeing Harry _FINALLY_ begin his first year at Hogwarts.

WARNING: Chapter contains depictions of strong semi-graphic violence and some language.

Rated: Fiction M (_I've rated this chapter M for very specific reasons, much like before with a previous entry! If you don't like it, don't read it!_)

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**Chapter 6**

**Assault in the Streets**

**Year 1 - ****Leaky Cauldron/Diagon Alley, London**** \- Earth**

After several grueling hours of trying out countless different types of wands between each one of them, which in turn produced some rather interesting and often undesirable results, Harry, Ron, and Neville, along with the Weasleys, Frank, and Josh all _finally_ exited Ollivanders wand shop together and headed straight back to the Leaky Cauldron, where they found the Lovegoods (_as well as Ginny Weasley_) waiting for them there, all the while still chatting with Hagrid (_indicating that the Weasleys, Frank, and Josh had all departed the wand shop previously for a short time to take a break from waiting around for Harry, Ron, and Neville to each find their respective wands_) who had in fact stopped by the wand shop nearly an hour or so earlier to show Harry an owl which he had gotten for the little boy as a _very_ belated birthday gift, since Potter's birthday officially landed on the date of July 31st and it was already close to the end of the month of August.

Harry had in fact, upon turning to face the store window when Hagrid had lightly tapped on it to get the little boy's attention, recognized the little white-winged creature immediately and ran outside for a minute or two after placing the wand that he was trying out back onto the desk.

"Hedwig!" he exclaimed with sheer delight the moment he saw the owl that was perched in the cage which Hagrid was carrying.

Upon hearing that, everyone aside from Varner within the wand shop (_including Hagrid who had heard him from outside_) stared at the little boy in confusion for a moment or so before Harry explained that the owl in question was the exact same owl that had delivered his acceptance letter to him all the way from the Hogwarts School on Earth, which in turn was many light-years away from Coruscant and the Jedi Temple; across the vastness of space, thus prompting Harry to surmise that it was actually the Force itself that lead the owl (_of whom he had named Hedwig while it was briefly with him_) there in the first place. Though, he didn't mention however that Sirius Black had assisted Potter in choosing a name for the animal while it was with the little boy for a large part of the day before setting it free to return back to where it had come from.

Potter had also, as a formal apology for inadvertently turning his friend's hair color to a funny shade of rosy-pink earlier, boughten Ronald his own wand for him from Ollivanders shop.

"Where is Alice at, Hagrid? Is she upstairs?" asked Frank, once the group had returned to the Leaky Cauldron.

"I do believe so, yes," the half-giant answered him, thus prompting Longbottom and the others to all immediately head-up to the second floor of the inn to see just how things were going with Alice and little Hermione, but also to inform his wife that they were all ready to leave too. Although, both the Lovegoods and Ginny Weasley had decided to remain downstairs with Hagrid until it was officially time to go.

"Alice? Alice, dear, it's time to leave," said Frank the moment they entered into the lounge area.

His wife instantly turned her head towards the whole lot of them and slowly put a finger to her lips; instructing everyone to be silent. "Shhh. Keep it down. She's asleep," Alice whispered in a gentle yet firm voice, who in turn was comfortably seated in a rocking chair that was facing directly towards a softly-lit fireplace.

Steadily crossing the room, Harry, Ron, and Neville all casually approached the spot where Mrs. Longbottom sat tenderly swaying back and forth in the rocking chair, all the while cradling little Hermione in her arms. The child in question appeared to be sleeping rather peacefully without a care in the world, like a tiny wingless cherub, as she lay all snuggled-up and warm while lightly sucking on her thumb before Alice then resumed humming a pleasant lullaby to her, of which she had currently been doing until the others walked in.

Looking at his wife while in deep thought for a moment, Frank immediately turned to face both of the Weasleys and quietly asked them something in private, of which they both nodded to him in agreement before he in turn steadily approaching Alice and quietly whispering into her ear.

Alice immediately looked up at her husband and nodded with a warm smile on her face upon hearing what he had to tell her, and Longbottom then proceeded to head downstairs to the bar for a couple minutes, only to return to the lounge area a short time later with something that looked like a small white hanging door sign clutched in his right hand. And from what Josh could fleetingly make out as Frank passed by him, the Jedi Knight noticed the writing on the door sign which read: _'Longbottom, Room 7, For 1 Night'_, inscribed on it.

Ron instantly looked over at both his mother and father as Alice slowly rose from the rocking chair and casually went into the room that Frank had just now hung the sign from the room's door on with Hermione still cradled in her arms.

"Wait, what's going on?" he asked a bit confused. "I thought that we were all leaving."

"Hermione and the Longbottoms are going to stay here for the night, dear," Molly answered him quietly. "Given that she isn't old enough to Apparate and that she also apparently hates flying due to the way in which we arrived here earlier thanks to Varner, as well as to the fact that she's still asleep. Therefore, Alice and Frank both feel that she shouldn't be woken-up at this time."

"But tomorrow I'll take the car first thing in the morning to come rough to the Leaky Cauldron and pick them up before heading off to work," Arthur immediately added.

Ron nodded in reply before walking over towards the state room that Alice had just gone into with both Harry and Neville a few paces ahead of him. And upon entering the room, Ron noticed a dark brown wooden crib that was situated along one of the corner walls, with little Hermione sound asleep inside it.

After a bit, the Weasleys along with Harry and Josh all said their goodbyes to the Longbottoms before retrieving the Lovegoods as well as Ginny from the barroom downstairs, with Molly explaining to her daughter that Frank, Alice, and Neville were going to spend the night at the Leaky Cauldron since Hermione was currently sleeping and they didn't want to wake her up. And once everyone in the group (_including Hagrid_) all stepped through hidden entrance to the inn and back out onto the not-so-busy London side-street as the evening sun was beginning to set, they walked for sometime until they soon noticed, and then strode directly towards a back alleyway to avoid being seen by any curious or wandering eyes, as they were all about to depart for the Burrow via the same way that they had arrived. Except for Hagrid, or course, who was just about to leave for his hunt again by way of Sirius' motorbike.

Suddenly, Josh halted in his tracks (_as did Harry_), and they both spun on their heals right as a number of loud bangs were heard by everyone that were currently roaming the streets, who in turn all ran screaming for their lives as several stray projectiles flew past, barely missing the others in the group as they all instantly turned on a dime; startled by what was happening. Though, a few of them managed to strike Arthur Weasley in the upper right arm, right shoulder, and back just as he was turning around, thus instantly knocking him over flat onto his back in sharp agonizing pain.

"Arthur!" cried Molly in disbelief the moment she saw her husband get hit.

"Daddy!" Ginny yelled in both fright and despair as she promptly broken down in tears upon seeing her father writhing on the ground, covered in blood from his wounds.

Harry and Josh both quickly glanced behind them at what had just happened to Mr. Weasley, before Harry turned back to face the strange man who was pointing a gun towards the others and more importantly at Molly Weasley specifically.

"Who are you!?" Harry demanded sharply. "Why are you doing this!?"

"Where is she!?" the man yelled, clearly ignoring the little boy. "I know you freaks have her! NOW WHERE IS SHE!?"

Josh, having recognized the armed assailant and knew full-well of whom he was talking about, suddenly bolted forward with lightning-speed and slammed the gunman into the brick-wall of a building that was a few feet over to their right and held him up against it off the ground by his throat as the stranger dropped his weapon and began clutching at his throat as well as futilely clawing at Varner's hand and arm to get free.

"**_FREAKS‼ YOU'RE ALL A BUNCH OF FREAKS‼_**" the man gasped with absolute fury as he started laughing quite rather dementedly.

Varner, while fuming with a strongly pimped-up rage, violently yanked the stranger away from the wall and with a tightly clenched fist that was seemingly glowing with Force Lightning, virtually jack-hammered the guy square in the ribs and sent him flying backwards a number of yards.

"That's for Hermione!" shouted Josh angrily as he stomped towards the stranger again, not realizing that he inadvertently kicked the shooter's gun directly towards him, who in turn was now writhing in tremendous pain on ground himself as he tried most frantically to get away however possible. But it was no use, as Varner grabbed him by the scruff of his coat and lifted him off the ground once more, preparing to finish him off.

The stranger looked on with wide eyes, now broken and bleeding, as Josh tightened his fist with Force Lightning building-up to a massive intensity inside his palm. "And this… is for Arthur, you son of a bitch!"

"Josh, stop it! What are you doing!?" Molly yelled at the young Jedi Knight in disbelief.

"It's Granger! Hermione's father - her adoptive father!" Varner answered over his shoulder.

"Leave him be and come help Arthur! _Please!_" Molly pleaded with upmost desperation. "He's waning fast!"

Knowing full-well that Molly was right, Josh released his grip on the man and started walking back towards the others just as the noise of police cars with their sirens blaring could be heard racing towards the whole lot in response to all the commotion from quite a long ways off.

****_BANG! _****_BANG!_****

Two more shots promptly rang out moments later as Josh stumbled ever so slightly, more in surprise and shock than in any actual pain, as he felt a red-hot needle-like pricking sensation in the back of his right leg, and he groaned under his breath in frustration upon glancing back at Granger who was now aiming the gun at him.

"Just… give me one second, will you?" Varner requested as he momentarily looked over at Molly and the others.

He moved back towards Granger who continued to fire several more rounds at him, all with little to no effect whatsoever, as the wounds created by the bullets striking Varner simply healed over almost within an instant due to him having learned, practiced, and mastered many telekinetic abilities (_both with his superpowers, as well as through the Force_) while during his time both within the Grid and outside of it also. The last shot that was heard was immediately followed by a bone-chilling scream as Josh forcefully stomped on the weapon; crushing both it and Granger's hand all in a single move, before the young Jedi yanked Granger up off the ground and held him in the air once more.

"You bastard! You've crushed my bloody hand!" Granger yelled angrily while still in pain. "What are you gonna do? Kill me?"

Josh instantly pulled the man closer to him so that they were practically nose-to-nose; staring eye-to-eye with each other as the young Jedi Knight gave him a rather ominous grin in response.

"Oh, believe me," Varner remarked as his eyes turned to a dim orange glow. "You're gonna wish that's all I did to you."

Suddenly, in the mere blink of an eye, both men vanished into the clouds that stretched across the evening sky and were gone.

Ron, while looking down at his slowly-dying father after witnessing Josh take-off into the clouds and dragging the stranger along with him; effectively leaving the group there all alone, began to slowly tear-up until he also finally broke-down crying himself in total fear of not knowing what exactly they were going to do.

Harry, meanwhile, was using his fairly meager skills with telepathy to try and communicate with Josh through the Force almost immediately after watching him leave while dragging Granger along, who was technically being held captive by the young Jedi Knight, and warned him not to do anything that he either might regret or anything that would potentially lead him towards the Dark Side for that matter. But also for him to come back immediately, since they desperately needed his help to save Arthur Weasley's life.

And while all of that was happening, everyone in the group could plainly hear the sirens of the police cars steadily getting louder in the distance, when suddenly a silvery orb of light quite unexpectedly emerged from within the dark shadows of another much smaller back alley that was located in-between two narrowly-spaced buildings a short distance off, and instantaneously shot upwards into the sky before launching itself in another direction with lightning speed and completely disappearing from view.

Upon turning in the direction of where the light had come from, Harry and the others watched as a tall and rather able-bodied man stepped out from the shadows, only to reveal Josh who was now standing on the other side of the street. And yet, there was something very different about him which everyone in the group could clearly make out; as he was no longer wearing his Jedi robes or tunic, but rather a striped navy blue three-piece suit and tie with dark brown shoes, as well as a navy blue flat cap and full-length overcoat.

"Josh? Is - is that… really you?" asked Harry with a bit of uncertainty, given the young man's appearance.

The individual merely smiled and let his head droop as he exhaled an amusing chuckle in response. "Hey, Harry," he simply replied after raising his head again to look directly at the little boy, thus confirming that it was indeed Josh. "It's been awhile."

Glancing over at Arthur Weasley, who was nearly unconscious due to the loss of blood as well as to the trauma of the assault, Varner immediately walked over to him and rested a hand on his wounded shoulder after shifting his body ever so slightly onto his left side as he crouched down next to him. A moment later, the bullet wounds in Weasley's arm, shoulder, and back instantly and completely healed-up only once the slugs that were still inside of him had recoiled back out the same way they went in, before dropping to the ground.

Molly looked up at Varner with grateful tears in her eyes just as Arthur awoke to groggily find nearly everyone in their small party ether standing or kneeing beside him. "Thank you so much for saving him," she voiced with upmost sincerity and gratitude.

Josh simply smiled and nodded in response, when right at that moment, several robed figures appeared out of the air and immediately walked over to the group to assess the situation.

"Oh, my gracious! Molly, what happened?" asked Professor McGonagall, who was among those who had appeared. "Is Arthur alright?"

"He's been shot," Josh immediately answered upon glancing towards her direction. "But I did manage to get the slugs out, though. You should have him looked over just to be safe. And-"

Just then, the police cars came hurtling down the road as they approached the scene and promptly slowed to a stop, with the officers immediately exiting their vehicles as they looked on in utter confusion as to what exactly was going on. But Josh immediately walked up to them and explained the situation at hand, stating that someone had in fact been shot and that the shooter was now long gone, but that the victim in question was fine due to Varner's assistance; as he was nearby and therefore able to help.

After providing a description of the assailant, as well as in which direction the shooter had "_fled_" to, Josh and the others then promptly took Arthur Weasley over to a nearby hospital since he had been injured by a "_Muggle weapon_" and not a Magical one. And while at the hospital, Varner privately told both Harry and the Weasleys (_as Hagrid had taken the Lovegoods back to their residence before returning with McGonagall and the other Professors to Hogwarts_) that even though he had only been away for a couple of minutes at the very least from their perspective, he was actually absent for several years: a little over twelve years to be precise.

Harry and the Weasleys looked at one another in confusion, until Josh explained that while he was asleep in the middle of the night when he and Harry had stayed over at the Burrow (_courtesy of the Weasleys_); the same night that the incident concerning Hermione had occurred, Varner had received a disturbing vision of what he now knows to be a major future event that will undoubtedly transpire; something that will not only effect the Wizarding World or even simply Britain in general, but the Earth and all of it's inhabitants as a whole, effectively changing the course of world history forever, as he had been having different versions of the same exact Force Vision time and again for quite a long while now, during the years that he was "_growing-up all over again_" for the second time.

"What, you mean like… _an invasion?_" asked Harry uneasily.

Josh simply nodded in reply to the little boy's question. "Though by whom, and more importantly… when - well, that I do not know…yet," he added.

Ron walked up to the young Jedi with a curious expression on his face, but only after Varner had reassured everyone in the group that the events which he had foreseen wouldn't occur for the next several years, due in part because he had glimpsed much older _teenage_ versions of Harry, Ron, Neville, and a girl that he didn't recognize, within a handful of said visions, while merely pointing out that he's completely unclear as to the exact date and time that the invasion will commence.

"You mentioned that you've been gone for the last several years. Where exactly?" the redhead inquired.

"Over in the US of A; just across the pond, as they say here in Britain," remarked Josh. "Qui-Gon came to me and instructed me to travel over to the North American continent as a starting point for me to help prepare the world for what's coming. He also told me to "_let the Force guide you_" at all times, and that I would know precisely what to do, when and how to do it as the Force had willed. So I initially did as he had requested, and as it so happens, the Force apparently directed me to go back to the year 1996, as it provided the means to do so, and continue from where I left off with my life when I was still ten-years-old and to finish "_growing up_", quite literally as my ten-year-old self I might add. Although, I didn't go straight back to where I previously had lived with my folks."

"Why not?" Harry questioned almost at once.

Josh sighed under his breath and then proceeded to tell them effectively the same thing that he had previously explained to Padmé Amidala years earlier, adding that it was also apparently not what the Force was advising him to do either. He also told them that while he was out leisurely walking around the streets of the city of San Francisco in the state of California (_of which he was originally from_), he met and befriended an elderly woman named Penny Halliwell, who as it turns out was a witch herself.

"Did she attend Hogwarts at all, do you know?" asked Ron.

Varner immediately shook his head. "No, she didn't attend Hogwarts, Ron. She's from America, not England. If she did go to a school for learning Magic, or rather the Force as it were, then it most likely would have been the Ilvermorny School of Witchcraft and Wizardry all the way over on the opposite side of the country in the state of Massachusetts…as I also did. Although, I highly doubt that she went there at all."

"What?" Molly asked with a stunned look on her face. "What are you talking about?"

Just then, the doctor who had examined Arthur came into the waiting area where Harry, Josh, and the rest of the Weasley family were anxiously waiting to hear news of his current condition.

"How is he?" inquired Varner as he and the others all stood-up from where they each sat.

"He's resting now," the doc answered. "He's very lucky to have made it here when he did, thanks to both you and his family. But he may require a blood transfusion to replace what he lost due to his injuries."

"May we go see him?" Molly beseeched rather greatly. "Please! I just wanna be certain he's okay."

"As I stated, he's resting now, Mrs. Weasley," the doctor tried to reassure her. "He's quite weak from the amount of blood lost, and will most likely need a transfusion in order to fully recover. And he will also most likely have to stay over for a night or two just so that we can be absolutely sure that he's on the mend as well."

"Mum!" a male voice suddenly rang-out clear as crystal. "Where's Dad? Is he okay?"

Bill Weasley promptly came running up to his mother from literally out of nowhere, and the two firmly embraced each other for several long moments, before Bill then firmly hugged the other members of his family in turn.

"I just heard from the Professors at Hogwarts about what had happened. How is he?" the young man asked frantically.

"He's alive… thanks in part to Mr. Varner here," Molly immediately answered her son as she gestured toward the young Jedi Knight.

Josh casually walked up to Bill Weasley as he held out his hand to introduce himself. And after the two young men greeted each other, Molly then explained to her son about what had occurred as well as what the doctor had told her just a few moments ago.

Without even hesitating, Bill immediately offered to use his own blood for the transfusion procedure in order to help get Arthur back-up to a speedy and full recovery as quickly as possible. And when Molly became slightly worried over the medical expenses of their _visit_, Josh stated at once that he would pay for the full cost personally and that she didn't need to trouble herself with such matters; that the only thing that both she and her family needed to do was be by Arthur's side.

A few minutes later, a nurse came into the waiting area and then lead Bill Weasley into a back room to prep him for the procedure while Molly and the other Weasley members were all allowed a brief check-in on Arthur before leaving for the Burrow. Though, at the last moment, Molly announced that she would stay over at the hospital for the night to be with her husband when he woke-up in the morning.

Varner then decided to take Harry and the rest of the Weasley siblings back to the Burrow to get some much needed shuteye for the night, and that they would all return in the morning soon after picking up both the Longbottoms and Hermione from the Leaky Cauldron in Arthur's place. And after Molly agreed with him on that, the remainders of the group promptly exited the hospital and went straight back to the Burrow.

That night, as everyone was gradually crawling into their own beds, both Ron and Ginny couldn't stop thinking about their father's condition at the hospital, with little Ginny ultimately crying herself to sleep (_which in turn kinda got Ron himself going in that direction as well_), only to abruptly wake-up screaming and crying but a few hours later after experiencing a horrible nightmare in which she dreamt that Arthur had passed away in the hospital from his injuries.

Harry, meanwhile, had been having a rather pleasant dream about being back on Coruscant at the Jedi Temple with Sirius. But soon, the dream started to shift and warp into something… dreadful. In his mind, the young Padawan Learner felt the ground shake and splinter beneath him. And then, the walls and ceiling of the Temple began crack, crumble, and finally collapse both all around and above him as the colossal structure fell to pieces. Potter clamped his eyes shut, only to reopen them a moment later and find himself now standing in an unfamiliar place with a large stone archway.

"_Avada Kedavra!_"

Suddenly, a bright green flash of light quite literally came out of nowhere just as Harry was able turn around on his heals in time to see Sirius staring at him with a rather stunned expression on his face as his godfather appeared to fall backwards through some sort of an invisible shade in the center of the archway and subsequently vanish right in front of Potter's eyes.

Bolting upright in his bed, Harry's eyes shot open in the dim evening light. He was breathing heavily and he could feel his heart pounding inside his chest. As he steadied his breathing and heart-rate by using a meditation technique which Yoda had taught him, his vision slowly became more clear within the darkness, as he inwardly started telling himself over and over that it was only just a dream, and nothing but a dream; that Sirius was still alive and there was absolutely nothing to worry about concerning his godfather.

Almost immediately, though, he could hear the terrified screams and cries of little Ginny Weasley in another room of the Burrow, and slowly got up out of bed to go check on her. Yet, as he was slowly making his way to the door of his bedroom to open it, a rather strange noise suddenly arose in his head. At first, he didn't know what to make of it, until the noise gradually became audible sounds that he could clearly recognize as being that of a rather tiny voice; a very small and distressed male voice of what sounded an awful lot like a frightened toddler.

"_Hawwy! Heyp me! PEASE! HEYP ME!_"

Potter could clearly hear the baby begin to cry as it's fearful and distressed voice gradually faded in his mind.

As all of that was happening, Josh himself was experiencing a strange Force Vision, much like the very first one he'd had (_along with several others which were quite similar to it since then_), back when he first met the Longbottoms and shook Neville's hand in Ollivanders shop.

In the vision, Varner could see the faint image of what appeared to be a white blanket that was rapidly sinking beneath the violently churning waves of the ocean as a colossal storm raged, with what clearly looked like the distinct outline of a baby that was wrapped inside of it, even as the wind and waves pelted the young Jedi from every angle, much as they had done so whenever he had had the visions both time and again in the past. But this time was slightly different than all of the other previous experiences, as he could all of a sudden clearly hear the quite rather pained and sorrowful feminine voice of someone he didn't recognize at all ringing out across the wide expanse on the ocean as she spoke of the exact name which Josh had heard of in his first vision that he had had upon shaking Neville Longbottom's hand upon their first meeting.

"_Corvus… Corvus… Corvus Lestrange is already dead! I killed him!_"


	8. Ch 7 - Leaving for Hogwarts (Year 1)

Author's Note: This chapter is now up and ready to view. Sorry that I was taking so long on this. Please let me know of any writing errors within it.

* * *

**Chapter 7**

**Leaving for Hogwarts**

**Year 1 - Assorted Locations - Earth**

Early the next morning, once everyone got up and had breakfast, and after Josh quickly showered and changed into some fresh clothes which he had instantly materialized from wherever the location of his current residence was, of which he didn't reveal to either Harry or anyone else; thus wanting to keep his dwelling-place a total secret until he felt the time was right to unveil his address, all of the Weasley siblings who were present exited the Burrow with the two Jedi and headed for a garage that was situated just a few yards away from the house.

"Um, why are we all going over to the garage?" Ron asked in confusion. "That's where dad's car is." Suddenly, a realization instantaneously hit him and he ran directly in front of the Jedi Knight, thereby blocking his path and halting him dead in his tracks. "Whoa, whoa, whoa! Hang on! You are not thinking of taking our father's car out for a drive!"

Josh immediately shook his head. "Nope. I'll be taking my own vehicle for a ride."

"What are you talking about?" Ron asked, even more confused now.

"Just be patient…and you'll see," Varner answered with a tiny smirk.

As the Weasleys followed the two Jedi over to the main garage doors, Ron glanced curiously up at Josh as he noticed him take _something_ from inside his left pants pocket, yet couldn't tell exactly what it was. A moment later, the double garage doors opened wide to unveil a humongous interior, with all sorts of different kinds of tools, gadgets, and equipment (_both modern and futuristic_), placed on and within various workbenches, tool-racks, shelves, and drawers along all three of the inner walls.

"Ah, Josh, this isn't our garage. At least, it's not the _interior_ of our garage," remarked Ron, looking around at the place now in absolute confusion as to what had just happened.

"Nope, it's my garage actually," remarked Varner as he held up a rather peculiar-shaped skeleton key. "I used this on the garage door's locking mechanism. Don't worry, I'd never break and enter into someone else's property, if that's what you're thinking."

"But… how did you do that?" asked Percy curiously. "Was it by using Magic?"

Josh shrugged at the older boy's line of questioning. "Ahhh, well in a way, yes. I created this key which in turn allows me to gain access to virtually almost any location on the planet that has a door lock in-between me and it that I need to get to, even if I'm not at the exact spot where the area that I need to gain access to is based. And remember, it's the "_Force_", and not "_Magic_" as you think of it as being."

Walking over to the far side of the garage where a rather large gray-colored tarp shielded a strange vehicle from view, Varner grabbed hold of the thick groundsheet and quickly yanked it back; off to the left and away from the group, revealing an airspeeder that was a little bigger in size and scale than average.

"Whoa! What is that?" exclaimed Ron in utter amazement as soon as he saw the speeder.

"It's an airspeeder, Ron," Harry answered him before looking at Josh with a peculiar expression on his face. "But… I've never seen this type before, Josh."

"That's because I designed and built this customized speeder myself actually," replied Josh. "All those courses in physics, engineering, and mechanics paid off."

"I thought you mentioned that you had attended Ilvermorny School over in the United States," Ron stated, looking a bit perplexed at the Jedi Knight.

Varner nodded in response to the redhead's comment. "Yes, I did, Ron. But I also took the time to finish-up with my regular education from where I left off outside of Ilvermorny too. Gradually worked my way up through all of the remaining grades, went through high-school-"

"So, does that mean you're in collage now?" asked Harry, as everyone in the group climbed into the slightly extra-wide and long airspeeder.

Josh glanced down at the little boy who in turn sat next to him in the front passenger seat. "Actually, I just finished early a couple of weeks ago. I've been somewhat considering of late about attending a university to further my studies and education in a number of different fields, but I haven't made a final decision on either where or even _if_ I'll attend, yet. Just remember, Harry, that you're never too old to discover something new that you didn't know before."

After the engines on the speeder roared to life, Josh pressed gently down on the accelerator pedal and the vessel steadily hovered out of the garage, before he used the Force to both close and bolt the double doors shut. With that, the airspeeder gradually levitated up into the sky and then sped off towards the location of the hidden passageway which led directly to the Leaky Cauldron inn, where the group once again found Alice Longbottom sitting comfortably and quietly in the rocking chair with little Hermione cradled in her arms up in the lounge area of the inn after they had all gotten out of the airspeeder upon it's descent and landing into the shadows of a nearby alleyway not too far from the hidden entrance to the Leaky Cauldron.

Longbottom delightfully glanced over as the group silently made their way into the room while she continued gently rocking the precious little munchkin in her arms, with Hermione in question feeding most ardently from a bottle of warm milk as though she were practically dying of starvation.

"Now, now, not so fast. Hey, not so fast, little one," Alice softly cooed to the baby as she tried coaxing Granger to take smaller sips from her bottle without much success.

Upon watching Alice and Hermione for a bit, Josh promptly turned his head to look over at Percy and inquire whether he and his siblings wanted to go check-in on Arthur and Molly at the hospital, or if they all wanted to remain here for a little while longer with the Longbottoms, with Varner in turn suggesting that he go over to the hospital alone and see if their father was in good shape to come over to the Leaky Cauldron after getting discharged from the hospital, before they all headed back to the Burrow.

The oldest Weasley boy in the group then asked the rest of his siblings if they all wanted to go visit their father in the hospital and see whether or not if he's well enough to come home, or if they instead wanted to remain here with the Longbottoms and little Hermione at the Leaky Cauldron until either both he and/or just Varner returned from checking-in on Arthur and Molly.

Ron, Ginny, and the twins all gladly agreed to go over and check-in on their father's well-being at the hospital, but Harry decided to remain behind with Hermione and the Longbottoms at the inn so that he could stay and chat with Neville.

Josh immediately nodded his approval at the little boy's request, and then he along with the Weasley siblings all went downstairs and exited the inn to head straight back to the airspeeder. As they did so, Varner suddenly stopped dead in his tracks for a brief moment; his senses alert and on guard for anything suspicious or out of the ordinary, as he could feel a tiny disturbance in the Force that seemed to be emanating close-by, almost like they were being watched by either something or someone that wasn't supposed to be there.

"What is it?" asked Percy, who walked up to and stood beside the young Jedi Knight almost at once.

"I don't know," Varner replied quietly, yet with an apprehensive tone in his voice. "Just a feeling. It may be nothing."

Once everyone had climbed into the airspeeder after walking back to where Josh had kept it hidden from view, they flew directly to the hospital where both Arthur and Molly were patiently waiting for them to arrive, all the while making sure to mask both their presence as well as the speeder's existence from the public down below in the city streets by way of Josh utilizing the Force along with his superpowers to hide the vehicle's noise and appearance just as he had done before when they had all departed from the Burrow earlier.

After landing in a deserted alleyway near the hospital, everyone made their way to the patient room inside the hospital where Arthur (_now __conscious_) was staying, with Molly comfortably sitting in an armchair by his side.

"Daddy!" Ginny practically shrieked the moment she could clearly tell that her father was alive upon entering the room; immediately sprinting forward and jumping onto the hospital bed, nearly landing on top of him. And as she threw her arms around him, hugging Arthur rather tightly, he could tell that something was very wrong as he could feel her little body shaking against him.

"Careful, Ginny!" exclaimed Molly the instant she saw her daughter practically tackle Arthur, who in turn jolted back in surprise as he clearly wasn't prepared for that. "Your father's still not-"

"Ginny? Hey. What's wrong?" Arthur asked softly as he gently pulled her off of him to look at her, only to immediately pull her back into his arms upon seeing that she was in tears.

Molly gently leaned-in closer towards her daughter to see what all the fuss was about, before promptly and quite firmly wrapping her own arms comfortingly around Ginny upon noticing that her little girl was crying rather hysterically.

"Sweetheart, whatever is the matter?" asked Molly only but a few minutes later as she was deeply worried over the current state of her daughter.

Ginny, along with Ron, both started to explain about the events that went on the night before at the Burrow: how they both weren't able to sleep due to the two siblings constantly thinking and worrying over Arthur's condition at the hospital, with Ginny ultimately crying herself to sleep, thus causing Ron to partially follow suit, as well as Ginny telling both of her parents that she subsequently woke-up screaming and crying with absolute fright only just a few hours later because she had experienced a truly awful nightmare in which she dreamt that Arthur had passed away from his injuries.

"Th- The- The worst part is… that it all seemed so very real!" cried Ginny frantically, before she promptly threw herself into Molly's arms and buried her face deep into the woman's chest as she once more started to sob uncontrollably, which in turn got Ron going in almost the exact same matter as well (_though not as emotionally distraught as his little sister was_), and Mrs. Weasley instantly embraced her two youngest children quite firmly as she simply held them most comfortingly in her arms.

After a while, Molly gradually calmed them both right down while Josh speculated that Arthur was still not completely in shipshape to leave the hospital just yet, with Mr. Weasley confirming to him of this to be so. Varner then promptly stepped over to Arthur's side and gently placed his hand on the redhead's shoulder for a moment. And upon doing so, Molly's husband immediately began to feel an increase in his energy reserves, as well as whatever soreness in his back, shoulder, and arm slowly dissipate.

"There. You should being feeling back to yourself again by tomorrow morning," remarked the young Jedi after taking a few small paces back in order to allow Arthur to examine his shoulder and arm in perplexed wonderment, not fully grasping what had occurred just now.

"What did you do?" asked Molly in curious bewilderment.

"Gave him a little energy boost so that his cells will heal-up at a slightly faster rate than normal," Varner remarked.

Arthur suddenly felt his strength returning to him, as he was able to sit fully upright in his bed from the way in which his body was positioned only but a moment ago.

"Thank you," he expressed with utmost sincere gratitude.

Josh merely smiled in reply. "Don't mention it."

Upon glancing down at an expensive watch on his left wrist that was concealed underneath the sleeve of his overcoat and jacket, Varner then immediately asked all the Weasley siblings if they wanted to ether stay there with Arthur and Molly at the hospital, or if they all wanted to return to the Burrow, since Josh had plans to go and take Harry out shopping to buy some fresh new clothes to wear before he left for the train tomorrow which would take him to the Hogwarts School.

Ginny wanted to stay with her mother and father at the hospital, but Percy needed to get back to the Burrow in order to prepare for the upcoming new term of the year at Hogwarts, as well as the fact that he was looking forward to being made a Prefect at the school also; a position of which he had seriously been striving to acquire.

Fred and George also needed to get back to the Burrow since they both still had some last minute homework that needed to be finished-up with before they headed back to school for their as of now third year at Hogwarts, with Josh offering his assistance in helping them both to study for their remaining assignments, given his own years of attending Ilvermorny School over in the United States, to which both of the Weasley twins happily agreed. And although Ron begged and pleaded with his mother to let him stay as well, he finally relented when Molly prodded him to go with Josh and the others to retrieve both Harry and the Longbottoms from the Leaky Cauldron before heading back to the Burrow, as he had a _really_ big day ahead of him tomorrow and needed to get packed-up and ready to leave for the train station in the morning.

After saying their good-byes, Varner and the Weasley boys all walked back to the airspeeder and hopped inside it; immediately heading straight back to the Leaky Cauldron inn to pick-up Harry, Hermione, and the Longbottoms. There, they found Harry, Neville, and Frank all sitting around a table chatting with Hagrid and a few other patrons on the barroom floor. And upon entering the inn, Josh surmised right away that Alice was still upstairs with little Hermione just as she had been when the group had left for the hospital earlier.

Varner immediately walked over to the lot sitting around the table together and informed Harry that Arthur was going to remain at the hospital for one more night before he was fully well enough to return home with his family.

Frank then got up from his chair and went upstairs to inform his wife that Josh and the Weasleys were back and that it was time to go. As he entered the lounge area, he saw Alice getting up out of the rocking chair and begin to steadily pace back and forth in front of the now dead fireplace while gently rocking little Hermione in her arms.

"Oh! Hey, luv!" she exclaimed the moment she turned to see Frank entering the room. "I just finished burping Hermione. And let me tell you, the little munchkin sure had quite a lot of air in her tummy." She looked direct at Hermione and started to lightly tickle her, thus making the little girl giggle and laugh most adorably.

"_Didn't you? Yes, you did! Yes, you did! Coochie-coo! Coochie-coo!_" Alice playfully cooed to the baby while tickling her, before turning to look up at her husband again, who in turn was happily smiling and chuckling inwardly to himself as he amusingly watched his wife play with little Hermione for the brief moment of time.

"Top! Top!" squealed Hermione with tremendous laughter as she was being tickled. "Do ickle!"

Frank told his wife that Varner and the others had returned from seeing Mr. Weasley at the hospital, but that he was still not well enough to leave and go home with his family just yet. Alice then asked if it was time to leave, to which her endearing husband said yes, and that they should get whatever they had brought with them packed-up immediately.

"Alright, dear. Let me just get Hermione changed and then we'll go," said Alice as she walked over and kissed Frank on the lips, before turning and walking back into the stateroom where their family had all stayed the previous night. She promptly laid Hermione down on a changing pad, which she had retrieved from inside the diaper bag that Molly had handed over to her when she had offered to watch Granger for awhile back at the wand shop in Diagon Alley the day before, and proceeded to remove Hermione's clothes, as well as her wet and soiled nappy.

"Pee-yew! Somebody sure is a stinky little baby, aren't they?" she expressed playfully in a childish tone of voice that made Hermione giggle rather cutely, while the little one in turn clapped her hands together in amusement.

Alice quickly, as well as thoroughly cleaned and then powdered Hermione's naked little butt, before putting a fresh nappy on her. And upon affixing the tabs, Alice then dressed the little rascal in a tiny white long-sleeve fleece sleep-and-play footed onesie, with a hood that also had little bunny-rabbit ears and a small round fluffy tail made of cotton on the bottoms of the garment, once she had quickly washed her hands and disposed of the dirty nappy into a rubbish bin which was located in a nearby washroom, that is.

Frank and Neville then proceeded to gather up everything that they had brought with them out of the stateroom, while Alice in turn gathered up her belongings (_including the diaper bag_), before the entire Longbottom family went downstairs to where Josh, Harry, and the Weasley boys were all waiting for them. And once Frank returned the door sign to the bartender, everyone in their small group exited the Leaky Cauldron and immediately headed for the location of where Josh had parked the airspeeder, which in turn was quite well-hidden from the public's eye.

Upon the lot of them steadily making their way back to the Burrow, Josh made a brief stopover at the Longbottom's residence to see Frank, Alice, Neville, as well as little Hermione off (_since the tiny squirt had practically whined her little head off; wanting ever so vehemently to stay with them for the __time-being_) before returning to the Weasley's remote domicile. And a little over half an hour or so later, both Harry and Josh flew directly over to London so that Potter could finally get himself some casually descent everyday clothes to wear, that of which he _definitely_ needed.

While at the clothing shop, Harry was measured-up for just the right size of clothing that he needed at present. He then slowly walked through the "_Boys_" department of the store and picked out a few sets of various clothing styles (_that being both short and long-sleeve shirts, long pants and jeans, shorts, socks, and underwear; many of them in differing colors, patterns, and designs_) that he found interesting, while at the same time, earning himself a few odd glances and stares from other customers in the shop regarding his Jedi tunic, robes, and boots, with Varner stating that it was merely a costume to anyone (_mostly children_) who inquired to Harry about the current set of clothes he had on.

Harry also picked out a nice warm long-sleeve fleece jacket to wear, since it was now in the colder part of the year, and it was soon to get much, _MUCH_ colder as winter approached. And once Varner purchased everything for the little boy, they quickly stopped over at a shoe store to get Harry a new pair of shoes, as well.

After all was said and done, the duo flew straight back to the Burrow just in time for supper. And as soon as they had finished eating, Harry helped Josh with cleaning, pressing, and folding his new clothes; placing all of his long-sleeve shirts, long pants, as well as several pairs of both his socks and underwear into his trunk for school the following day, while also putting away the rest of his new clothes into a kid's dresser that was positioned inside one of the guestrooms that he was currently staying in. Potter then immediately went to take a nice warm bath, before slipping into his newly cleaned pajamas (_of which Varner had also purchased for him while they were out shopping_), and going right to bed that evening.

The following morning saw both Harry and the Weasley siblings all up bright and early. Josh had apparently left about an hour or so beforehand to go over to the hospital and see if Arthur and Molly were up and ready to go back home to the Burrow, hopefully in time to take Ron, Harry, and the twins over to the train station in order to see them all off to Hogwarts from a railway platform that was referred to as Platform 9¾. Percy had left sometime prior to everyone waking up in order to take the earliest train (_a steam locomotive known in the Wizarding World as the Hogwarts Express_) from Platform 9¾ straight over to the school so that he could prep for his new duties as Prefect.

Bill Weasley had come over to the Burrow a couple hours earlier to check on both his family as well as Harry in regards to a message that was delivered to him by owl. And while they were all sitting around the dinning-room table having breakfast, they suddenly heard a rather loud knock at the front door of the house, which Ron and Harry both immediately got up from their seats at the table and went over to see just who it was.

"Hagrid!" exclaimed Harry the minute that Ron opened the door.

"Hello, Harry! Ron!" the half-giant cheerfully replied upon seeing the two little boys greet him at the door. "Got someone here with me whom I think you've been very anxious to see return home to the Burrow. Am I right?"

Ronald's eyes immediately went wide with major excitement, as he knew right away of whom Hagrid was talking about. "Dad!"

Hagrid smiled down at the redhead as he promptly stepped aside to reveal not only Josh, but also Molly, Arthur, and Ginny all standing only but a few yards away from the front door, all of them smiling at the two youths who stood just inside the doorway of the Burrow, as both of the little boys stared in complete surprise at what they were in fact seeing right before their very eyes.

"DAD! DAD, YOU'RE OKAY!" Ron literally exploded with overwhelming joy as he bolted forward to embrace his father the instant he saw him, who in turn was not quite (_but almost_) ready for his youngest son to virtually tackle him where he stood.

"Oof! Easy there, sport!" Arthur remarked in surprise, upon him getting slightly knocked off-balance from the sheer impact of the blow. "You're not as little as you used to be."

As the twins walked up to Arthur and firmly embraced him, Molly promptly addressed all of the siblings almost at once. "Come on, kids. It's high-time we left for the station already. And we'll be late if we don't hurry."

Ron then went to get his things packed-up in the back of Arthur's car while Fred and George got all of their things ready, including the finished potions and other homework assignment stuff, which was needed for their new term at Hogwarts that Varner had helped them to complete just the night before.

Harry on the other hand gathered up his trunk and school supplies; putting them all (_along with Hedwig's cage_) in the rear passenger seat of Josh's airspeeder, of which the young Jedi used to bring Molly, Arthur, and Ginny all back to the Burrow.

Once everyone was ready, both Josh and Harry followed the Weasleys to the train station in their respective vehicles: the two Jedi in the airspeeder, and the Weasleys in their car (_which was an old beat-up 1962 Ford Anglia that Arthur had enchanted sometime ago in order to give it the ability to fly, as well as become invisible to the Muggle society_) before landing near the station only fifteen minutes prior to when the Hogwarts Express was scheduled to depart for the school.

While at the train station, Harry saw Neville walking towards the entrance to Platform 9¾ while accompanied by an elderly woman instead of his parents as the little boy steadily pushed a trolley along that was piled-up with his trunk and all his various other school supplies on it.

"Neville!" exclaimed Harry as he walked over to where Longbottom and the elderly woman now stood, while gradually pushing his own trolley which was also piled full of _his_ school supplies along.

"Hi, Harry!" Neville responded cheerfully the minute he noticed Potter walking over to him.

Harry looked up at the old woman a tad confused. "Neville, I thought your mum and dad were bringing you here. Where are they?" he asked.

"Dad had to go to work," Neville immediately answered him. "And Mum decided to stay home to look after Hermione since Grandma apparently didn't want to."

His grandmother immediately gave him a minutely sour look before turning to face Harry and introducing herself as Augusta Longbottom, who in fact was Frank's mother, as well as being a pure-blood witch herself.

Josh then stepped up behind Harry and lightly tapped him on the shoulder, to which Potter immediately turned around to look up at his mentor, sensing that Varner had something he wanted to say to the little boy before he went through the barrier and subsequently got aboard the train, which was due in the next eight and a half minutes.

"Harry, can I talk to you for a second?" asked Josh quietly.

The little boy nodded and immediately stepped off to the side to speak privately with the young Jedi Knight. "What is it, Josh?" he asked curiously.

Josh promptly exhaled softly through his nose as he glanced downwards at his feet for a moment, before looking directly at Harry again.

"I wanted to thank you for… what you did back there - the night that Arthur was shot," Varner remarked softly.

Harry looked up at Josh with a rather confused expression on his face. "What do mean, Josh? I don't think I quite understand? What exactly did I do, I mean aside from-"

Varner immediately nodded at him, and Potter suddenly realized what it was that he was trying to say. "Yes, Harry," he promptly answered. "When you called out to me through the Force, and, well…"

Potter, to his absolute horror, immediately shook his head in utter shock and disbelief. "Josh, what have you done?" the little boy asked as he forcefully grabbed both of the Jedi's arms. "WHAT HAVE YOU DONE!?"

"Harry! Harry!" shouted Ron from a short distance away, thus prompting Harry to immediately glance over at the redhead. "Are you coming? The train's about ready to leave."

Potter nodded to him in reply before taking one last brief glance up at Josh and then subsequently turned to walk back to where he had left the trolley with all of his things on it; pushing it over to where the Weasleys were immediately standing.

"Are you alright, dear?" asked Molly, with Harry promptly nodding his head at once in response to her question, though Ron could tell that something was in fact very wrong.

Immediately after Harry had passed through the barrier that lead directly onto Platform 9¾ upon following just behind Fred and George (_which Molly had instructed him on both what to do and how to do it_), he climbed aboard the train, followed immediately by Ron, not three minutes before the Hogwarts Express was set to leave the station.

While on their way to the castle aboard the train, both Ron and Neville could tell that Harry was particularly quiet for awhile. Just then, two little girls (_both identical twins_) casually walked up to the compartment which all three boys were currently seated in.

"Uh, hello? Excuse us, but…is it alright if we come in?" one of them asked politely. "All the other compartments are packed."

"Sure, come in," Ron immediately answered.

The two children then promptly stepped into the compartment and took a seat directly across from the three boys.

"I'm Parvati Patil, and this is my sister, Padma," said one of them.

"Hello. I'm Neville," replied Longbottom. "That's Ron, and this is Harry." He pointed directly to each of the two boys next to him in turn. Parvati and her sister, Padma, both immediately nodded "hello" to all three of them.

A little while later, all five children were engaged in conversation, with Harry being the least talkative of all of them. And when Ron asked his friend what was wrong, Harry merely stated that he couldn't believe that Josh would have done something so profoundly horrible.

"To who?" Neville asked in confusion.

"Granger," answered Harry bluntly.

Longbottom instantly stared directly at him wide-eyed in total shock. "You mean he did something to-"

"No. Not to her, Neville," Harry interrupted him with a reassuring tone. "To her adoptive father."

Upon hearing that, Longbottom instantly exhaled a huge sigh of relief. "Thank goodness," he expressed rather gratefully. "For a minute there, I thought you were talking about Hermione."

Parvati and Padma both looked at each other in total confusion, before turning to glance at all three of the boys again.

"Um, sorry, who are you talking about now?" asked Padma in bewilderment.

Harry then started to explain of the events surrounding what had occurred in London a few nights ago to the twin girls, including the part about Arthur Weasley getting shot by a Muggle weapon and that it was in fact Hermione's adoptive father who was responsible, thus resulting in Mr. Weasley needing to be hospitalized for awhile. But also of how Josh, while in a fit of rage, brutally attacked Granger in retaliation for what he had done to both Arthur and little Hermione too. Although, he didn't know of what exactly that man had done to her, yet Potter guessed that it must have been something truly awful. Especially for Varner to have done whatever it was that he did to Mr. Granger.

"That's just… horrible!" exclaimed Parvati in disbelief once Harry had finished. "Who would intentionally want to hurt their own child, whether she was adopted or not?"

"I don't know," Harry replied softly while shaking his head.

"How old is she, anyway? Hermione, I mean," Padma inquired curiously.

Ron told the Patil sisters that even though little Hermione was in actuality a mere ten years of age, realistically she only had the mental capacity of a baby as well as possessing the literal physique of a very small toddler. And before either Parvati or Padma could ask the redhead how such a thing like that could possibly be, a male voice over some loudspeakers promptly announced that they would be arriving at their destination within the next few hours.

The two sisters immediately looked at each other momentarily, before turning to glance at all three of the boys sitting across from them one last time; advising Harry, Ron, and Neville that they should probably change into their school uniforms as soon as possible since they were going to be reaching the school grounds within a matter of hours, with the Patil twins then promptly getting to their feet and casually walking out of the compartment to go and put on their own school robes as well.


	9. Ch 8 - The Midnight Brawl (Year 1)

Author's Note: This chapter is now up and ready to view. Let me know if there are any writing errors.

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**Chapter 8**

**The Midnight Brawl**

**Year 1 - Hogwarts Castle - Earth**

As the three boys removed their jackets to put on their long black school robes, Harry glanced out of the compartment window. It was getting rather dark, and he could see tall mountains and large forests under a deep purplish sky. The train also seemed to be gradually slowing down, and a strange-sounding voice promptly echoed throughout the passenger car.

"_We will be arriving at Hogwarts in five minutes time,_" it bluntly stated. "_Please leave your luggage on the train. It will be taken to the school separately._"

The train slowed right down and finally stopped a few minutes later as Harry, Ron, and Neville all joined the very large crowd of both first-year students, as well as second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, and last but not least, seventh-year students who were all thronging the corridor as passengers pushed their way toward the exit doors and out onto a tiny dark platform.

A large glowing lamp suddenly came bobbing over the heads of the students, as Harry, Ron, and Neville all simultaneously heard a familiar voice.

"First-years! First-years over here!" Hagrid loudly called out, as his big hairy face beamed over the sea of heads. He immediately glanced down to see Harry, Ron, and Neville all striding up to meet him. "Hello there, Harry! Ron! Neville! You boys alright?"

"Hi, Hagrid!" exclaimed the three little boys, one after the other, upon seeing him as they smiled.

The half-giant then gestured towards what appeared to be a steeply narrow pathway that lead out onto an enormous black lake, where a fleet of small boats sat waiting in the water by the shoreline for the students to climb into and take them across the lake.

"Come on, follow me!" he called out to the massive crowd of students. "Anymore first-years? Mind your step now! First-years, come on now, this way!"

Hagrid then turned and lead the first-year students carefully down the narrow path, while Harry noticed that the older students had broken off into different groups based on their school year-level, with each group promptly taking different pathways out away from the train which all presumably lead directly to the castle.

As all of the youngest students came out into the clearing near the shoreline where the boats were docked, there was a loud "_oooooh!_" of utter amazement in unison as the first-years were suddenly met by the wondrous sight of the castle with it's many turrets and towers, which in turn was perched atop the opposite side of a high mountain; it's windows sparkling in the starry night sky.

"No more than four students per boat!" Hagrid called out as everyone reached the dock.

Harry, Ron, and Neville all climbed into one boat along with another little boy who was a bit shorter than the rest of them, while Parvati and Padma both climbed into another boat alongside a redheaded little girl and a little girl with short black hair.

"Everyone in?" shouted Hagrid, who had a boat all to himself. "Right then. Forward!"

The fleet of small boats promptly sailed off all at once across the water and headed directly for the castle; each and everyone of them quietly gliding across the surface of the lake which was as smooth as glass.

Everyone was silent as all of the students stared up in absolute wonder and astonishment at the enormous castle which began to tower gradually overhead as the boats moved closer and closer towards the cliff-face on which it stood.

"All you lot, get your heads down!" yelled Hagrid over his shoulder as the first of the boats reached the cliff-side.

The students immediately bent their heads forward as the boats carried them through a curtain of ivy that hit a wide opening in the cliff-face. They were all carried along a deep dark tunnel which seemed to be leading them directly underneath the castle, until they reached a kind of underground harbor, where they then promptly clambered out of their boats; stepping at once onto small rocks and pebbles.

Everyone immediately clambered up a passageway which was carved out of the rock after Hagrid's lamp, once the half-giant had finished checking each one of the boats after all of the students had climbed out of them, and suddenly came out at last onto smooth damp grass to everyone's great relief; right in the shadow of the castle, before walking up a small flight of stone steps which lead them to a set of two huge oak front doors.

Hagrid then raised his gigantic fist and knocked precisely three times on the castle's massive double-doors.

The two doors swung wide-open instantly and a tall black-haired witch in emerald-green robes stood just behind them. She had a very stern face about her and Harry immediately recognized her as being the same witch that both he and Varner had met before, while visiting the Headmaster's office.

"First years, meet Professor McGonagall," announced Hagrid.

"Thank you, Hagrid. I will take them from here," the Professor remarked to the half-giant. She turned her attention towards the three little boys who were standing only but a few yards away, and nodded her head in their direction, with Potter nodding _his_ head back at her in response without so much as hesitating; knowing immediately that the gesture from McGonagall was solely meant for him as a greeting.

All of the students, as well as Hagrid, must have noticed the rather brief exchange between them 'cause all of the first-years instantly glanced back and forth at both Potter and McGonagall in absolute confusion, while Hagrid shot a questioning look at the Professor: a look that seemed to non-verbally ask if she was going to tell the students about the meeting that had taken place between her, Dumbledore, Varner, and of course Harry inside the Headmaster's Office. But McGonagall gave him a stern look in return that immediately told him that "_no_" she wasn't going to, and that it was of no importance or concern to any of the students.

While the first-years were following the Professor through the massive entrance hall as they gaped in both awe and wonder at the sheer rich detail and enormous size of the castle, Harry saw that the stone walls on either side were lit with flaming torches just like the ones at Gringotts Bank. The ceiling was too high-up for anyone to make out, and a magnificent marble staircase that was facing the group of students lead directly to the upper floors. And as everyone followed McGonagall across the flagged stone floor, Harry could hear the drone of several hundred voices just beyond a doorway to the right of him as he passed by it - the rest of the school must already be here - but the Professor instead showed all of the first-years into a small empty chamber off the hall.

Everyone crowded in, standing closer together than they usually would have as almost all of the students looked around quite nervously, and wondering inwardly to themselves as to ether what they were supposed to do, or what was going to happen next.

"Welcome to Hogwarts," said Professor McGonagall. "Now, in just a few moments, you will all pass through these doors and join the rest of your class-mates in the start-of-term banquet, which will begin shortly. But before you can take your seats in the Great Hall, you must all be sorted into your Houses. The ceremony, known as the Sorting, is very important because while you are here at Hogwarts, your House will be like your family. There are four Houses in total, which are so-named Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, and Slytherin. Your triumphs will earn you House points, while any rule-breaking will lose you House points. At the end of the year, the House with the most points will awarded the House Cup, which is a great honor to be sure. And I fully expect each and everyone of you to be an outstanding credit to whichever House becomes your own."

The students glanced around at one another, even more nervously than before, as they thus began quietly whispering to themselves most anxiously in unison.

"Silence, please," commanded McGonagall, and everyone who was murmuring instantly quieted down. "Now I suggest that you all smarten yourselves up as much as possible while waiting. I shall return once we are ready for you in the Great Hall. So, please wait…_quietly_."

She then turned to face the now opening doorway and walked into the Great Hall before the massive double-doors closed behind her once again, thus leaving all of the first-year students alone in the corridor.

Harry glanced about at all of the other students present, almost all of whom looked positively terrified out of their minds. One boy however with silvery-blonde hair was smirking quite rather menacingly.

"So, it's true, then. What they're saying on the train," the boy suddenly voiced loudly. "Harry Potter has returned to our world."

As the youth then slowly began pushing his way through the crowd of other students, who were all now whispering amongst one another over what they had just now heard, he was immediately followed by two rather chubby dark-haired boys, both of whom looked _very, VERY_ mean. To Harry, as well as both Ron and Neville, the two dark-haired boys looked like bodyguards.

"Oh, that's Crabbe and this is Goyle," the blonde-haired boy stated, as he gestured to each of the two dark-haired boys in turn, who were now standing on either side of him. "And my name is Malfoy. Draco Malfoy."

Ronald instantly let out a sharp snicker of laughter in sheer amusement at hearing the little boy's funny-sounding name, and Malfoy snapped his head at once in the redhead's direction; glaring at him angrily in response.

"You think my name's funny, do you?" spat Malfoy bitterly, with a cruel look of malice on his face. "No need to ask what yours is, do I? Red hair, freckles, and a hand-me-down robe? My father has told me all about you… _Weasley!_"

There was a few moments of utter silence among all of the first-years, before Malfoy then piped-up again as he turned to look directly at Harry.

"You're soon going to find out that there are some Wizarding families which are better than others, Potter," he remarked coldly. "And you don't want to go around making friends with the wrong sort of Wizarding folk." He briefly shot another cruel sneer at Ron, before turning his attention back to Harry once more. "I can help you there."

Malfoy then held out his hand for Harry to shake, but Potter immediately refused the gesture of friendship, knowing full-well that he was about to make his very first enemy within the student-body at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, given what he was just about to say.

"I think I can tell the wrong sort for myself, thanks… _Malfoy,_" Harry expressed in a rather cocky tone of voice, while flexing his eyebrows the instant he spoke the little boy's name.

At that moment, Draco Malfoy didn't just go red in the face, but turned a very pink tinge as he lowered his hand back to his side.

"I'd be careful if I were you, Potter," he remarked coldly. "Unless you're a bit more polite you'll end up in the exact same way as your filthy parents did. They didn't know what was good for them, either. And if you continue to hang around with pathetic swine like the Weasleys, well then mark my words, Potter, it will be the last thing you ever do."

Ron balled-up his fists and his knuckles cracked upon hearing the insult to his family that Malfoy had just made. "Say that again," he challenged, as his face went as red as his hair.

Draco turned on the redhead instantly, his eyes glaring with fire in them. "Oh, you're going to fight us, are you?" he sneered. "Well, come on then, I dare you to. You're whole wrecked family are nothing more that sniveling, Muggle-loving, blood traitors to our kind who embarrassingly give proper witches and wizards everywhere a bad name, you little Weasel."

Before anyone knew what had happened, Ron lunged forward with a loud yell and promptly tackled not only Malfoy, but also Crabbe and Goyle all at once onto the hard stone floor, then proceeded to beat the crap out of all three of them in turn to the astonishment of nearly every other one of the students present as they simply stood there watching; all of them glancing at one another in stunned confusion and silence.

After a moment, Harry then stepped forward and gently pulled his friend off of the three boys, who now all had broken and bloody noses. At least one of them had a black eye, while Malfoy had received a cut on his lower lip.

"Ron, stop it!" scolded Harry gently. "I know that you have a right to be angry with Malfoy, but believe me when I tell you that you don't want to fuel that emotion. It's-"

"What is going on here?" asked a sharp stern voice. Everyone immediately turned to see Percy Weasley coming up behind them.

Ron pointed directly at Draco and the other two boys, who were now looking as though they were trying desperately not to tear-up in front of the other students because of the intense pain due to the beating they had just received from the youngest Weasley boy.

"Those snakes were insulting our family, Percy!" he exclaimed quite ferociously. "They should be thrown out of the castle!"

"What is the meaning of all this ruckus!?" came Professor McGonagall's severe tone from clear the other direction, as no-one seemed to hear the large double-doors of the Great Hall open and then promptly close an instant later. "I specifically told you all to wait quietly!"

Ron turned sharply around to face her, a still angry expression on his face. "Professor, will you please throw those _vipers_ out of here?" he requested. "They are nothing but pure evil!"

"That is quite enough from you, Ronald Bilius Weasley!" chided Percy sharply. "You ever do anything like that again, and I'll be writing to Mother about it!"

Harry's friend suddenly went pale in the face upon hearing that from his own big brother. _How could Percy simply just stand by and do absolutely nothing about this, and especially after what Malfoy had just said about their family?_

McGonagall looked over at Percy directly. "Mr. Weasley, will you be good enough to escort those three to the Hospital Wing?" she instructed.

Percy then quietly lead Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle out of the small chamber and straight to the Hospital Wing for treatment. The three injured boys in question were all now silently crying in pain as they hid their faces from view of all the other students who watched them leave the corridor.

Harry immediately felt bad for them, but only for the reason that they had been injured by his friend. And even if they had indeed deserved it, he still didn't like seeing other small children get hurt, regardless of whether they were either friend or foe.

"Well, with a few of the students now absent, I'm afraid we may just have to postpone the Sorting Ceremony a little longer," said McGonagall, who was looking directly at Ronald with a very severe expression of utter disappointment. "If you had already been sorted, Mr. Weasley, I would most certainly have deducted House points, as well as given you full detention, for your serious lack of behavior just now."

Suddenly, without any warning, the Professor moved forward and sharply grabbed Ron by his wrist.

****_WACK!_****

"Ow!" Ron expressed somewhat painfully the moment McGonagall slapped him on the back of his hand.

She then gave the redhead a stern warning look before turning around and walking slowly back through the double-doors of the Great Hall once again, thus leaving all of the first-year students, who were all now glaring bitterly at Ron (_except for Harry and Neville_), alone once more for the second time as they all stood there now waiting quite rather impatiently for the Ceremony to start so that they could finally sit down and get something to eat, as they were all practically starving after the long journey on the Hogwarts Express earlier: their anxiety and fear about the Sorting now totally forgotten. And some of them, namely the smaller children, were beginning to get rather tired, almost to the point of wanting to nod-off while still on their feet.

"Way to go, Weasley!" one of the students voiced in an irritated manner. "Now, because of you, we'll have to wait even longer!"

The first-years were starting to get rather antsy due to their hunger and tiredness. One little girl, who was a redhead just like Ron was, looked very close to breaking down into tears as she clutched at her empty tummy in agony. Finally, after a few more tense minutes, she couldn't take it any longer and started to cry in pain.

Harry, upon hearing the little girl's anguished sobs, slowly walked over to her. "Hey, what's wrong?" he gently asked.

"It's my stomach. It hurts. I'm just so hungry," she sobbed terribly.

Potter gently put his arms around the little girl in a comforting embrace, immediately assuring her that everything would be okay and that they'd all be able to eat soon. Although, inwardly he hoped that what he had just told her was in fact true, as he was beginning to feel the effects of being hungry himself.

Just then, the doors which lead into the Great Hall opened up, and Professor McGonagall casually stepped into the small chamber once again. She immediately noticed Harry with his arms around the still crying redheaded little girl.

"Potter, what is the meaning of this?" she demanded.

Harry looked up at her from where he was standing, and he immediately told the Professor about the little girl's problem: that she was hungry and that her stomach hurt because of it. And so he felt the need to comfort her and to tell her that everything was going to be alright. McGonagall eased up after hearing Harry explain the current situation to her, and she immediately walked over to the two children; gently placing her hand on the little girl's shoulder.

The little girl promptly glanced up at McGonagall as her tears slowly slid down her cheeks. And the Professor slowly let a soft warmly caring smile cross her lips.

"It's alright, dear. I've spoken to the other Professors, as well as to the Headmaster, and they've all unanimously agreed that we will postpone the Sorting Ceremony until the morning. But that the start-of-term banquet shall proceed immediately," she stated gently, before putting an arm around both of the children, and lightly nudging them along with everyone else towards the entrance doors that lead into the Great Hall. "Come on now, dear. Let's get you something to eat."


	10. Ch 9 - Lending A Helping Hand (Year 1)

Author's Note: This chapter is up and ready. Please post in the '_Review_' section concerning any writing errors, or of anything else you would like to share otherwise.

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**Chapter 9**

**Lending A Helping Hand**

**Year 1 - Hogwarts Castle - Earth**

As everyone was being ushered towards the Great Hall, a bizarre cackling noise suddenly erupted from out of nowhere and a rather petite man with wicked dark eyes and a wide mouth, who floated cross-legged in the air, appeared directly in front of McGonagall, thus blocking her path along with all of the students into the Great Hall.

"Oooooooh!" he exclaimed with an evil cackle. "Icky firsties! What fun!"

"Peeves!" shouted McGonagall angrily. "Get out of my way and leave here at once before I hex you!"

"Ha-ha! Look at the old-" Peeves started to say before he was suddenly flung sideways across the corridor and vanished directly into the far wall of the chamber with a loud shriek of surprise.

The Professor immediately turned to see a few of the students with their heads momentarily ducked down low in order to avoid getting hit in the head or whacked across their faces by Harry, who had reached out with the Force and grabbed ahold of Peeves, before flinging his arm out in the direction that Peeves had been sent flying across the chamber and straight through the wall.

"Sorry, Professor," he apologized to the Deputy Headmistress as the students who had ducked out of the way promptly straightened themselves up again. "Who was that, anyway?"

"That's quite alright, Potter. But, please, do be more careful from now on," remarked the Professor sternly. "In any case, that was Peeves. He's the school poltergeist. And a most wrecked and vile one, at that." Harry nodded in response; pretending that he didn't know anything whatsoever about Peeves, even though he'd heard dozens upon dozens of rather nasty stories from Sirius concerning the poltergeist. McGonagall then immediately turned and continued through the doors into the Great Hall, with all of the students forming into two separate lines as they followed closely behind her.

Harry looked all around him in sheer awe and wonder at what he saw upon entering the Great Hall for the very first time. Even though he had heard plenty of stories from Sirius concerning this very large room, it was still a marvelous sight to behold: as it was lit rather abundantly by thousands upon thousands of burning candles which floated high above four _very_ long tables that were evenly spaced out on the Hall floor, where the rest of the students were all sitting.

All four tables were laid with glittering plates and goblets, and at the front of the Hall was another long table, where all of the teachers were sitting.

Professor McGonagall led the first-years up to the front of the Hall before turning around and asking everyone to find a seat, and once every last first-year student had found a place at any one of the four tables, the Headmaster, Albus Dumbledore, promptly stood up to speak.

"Welcome, everyone, to a new year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry," he proudly announced. "Now, before we begin the start-of-term banquet, I would just like to say a few words. First off, as we would normally begin this new term with the Sorting Ceremony in order to both commemorate and place newly arriving first-years into each of their appropriate Houses, but in light of most recent events this evening, we have decided to postpone the Sorting until tomorrow morning. So, to each and everyone of you here, make sure that you are all up bright and early at promptly six-o-clock sharp, and are here in the Great Hall for the start of the Ceremony."

Nearly everyone of the younger students immediately groaned at hearing this news; a large number of them due to their extreme hunger.

"And second, the first-year students should note that the forest on the castle grounds is strictly forbidden to all young pupils, to which a few of the older students would do well to remember that also," said Dumbledore as his twinkling eyes flashed in the clear direction of where the Weasley twins were seated. "I have also been asked by Mr. Argus Filch, the caretaker, to remind all of you that absolutely no Magic is to be used between classes in the corridors. Furthermore, Quidditch trials will be held in the second week of the term. Anyone of the _second-year_ students and above who is interested in playing for their House teams should contact Madam Hooch. And finally, I must tell you that this year, the third-floor corridor is strictly out-of-bounds to everyone that does not wish to suffer a most painful death."

The majority of the whole student-body instantly began muttering and whispering to one another about what had just been said, some of them were a bit confused while others began speculating and coming up with theories as to why the third-floor corridor was, as of this year, forbidden to enter.

Harry glanced over at Percy who was sitting just a few feet away on the opposite side of the table from him. "He's not serious?" he quietly muttered towards the older Weasley sibling.

"Must be," said Percy as he frowned at Dumbledore. "It's odd, though, because he usually gives a reason as to why we're not allowed to go somewhere - the forest is full of dangerous beasts, and everyone knows that. I do wish however that he'd have at least told us Prefects about it."

Potter briefly glanced in the Headmaster's direction just as Dumbledore was taking his seat again. Then, a moment later, when Harry turned his eyes back to the table, he suddenly found to his complete surprise and utter amazement that all of the dishes across the table, as well as all of the dishes along the three other tables, were now piled-up with food.

The first-years suddenly began to frantically grab a bit of everything in front of them: quickly filling their plates up to max capacity, while also taking large bites out of other pieces of food that they grabbed, before putting it on their now overflowing plates as well.

Harry briefly placed two fingers on his forehead, and all of the students momentarily stopped what they were doing, before they promptly resumed eating again, albeit at a more casually slower rate of pace. All of the teachers over at the High Table must have taken notice, because Potter suddenly felt a tap on his shoulder and turned to see McGonagall looming over him.

"Potter, might I have a word?" she asked quietly.

Harry shrugged and instantly turned his feet around to stand up from the table. "Sure," he politely agreed upon him shrugging in response to her request.

McGonagall then promptly asked Potter what had happened just now with all of the students in the Great Hall, as both she, Dumbledore, as well as the other teachers and Professors had immediately noticed every one of them (_especially all of the first-years_) momentarily stop what they were all doing, which coincided with her and the others at the High Table all confusingly looking at one another upon seeing Harry do whatever it was he just did.

"Oh, you mean me doing this?" said Harry, as he gestured with his hand; touching his forehead for a split-second with his two fingers before dropping his hand down back to his side. "I just telepathically suggested to mainly all of the first-year students to simply slow down while eating their food, is all. I mean, I know that everyone was rather quite hungry but I don't think that anyone would want to be going to sleep tonight with an upset stomach, due to them eating too much too quickly."

McGonagall nodded understandably. "Very well, Potter," she remarked with a slight smile. "That will be all, thank you."

Harry immediately gave a polite nod and smile back at her, before returning to his seat at the table, with Professor McGonagall herself turning and steadily walking back to her place at the High Table.

While the students were busy eating, a large number of what appeared to be ghosts floated both through the Great Hall's entry doors as well as up through the floor and also up through the long tables too. Although, these ghosts were of a palish-white hue, and not the typical bluish-white hue that Harry saw when he first encountered the Force Ghost of the late Jedi Master, Qui-Gon Jinn.

"Hello! How are you all this evening? And welcome to Gryffindor!" one male ghost cheerfully exclaimed the moment his head popped up from underneath the center of the table. He then casually floated up through and past the table altogether before slowly turning around to view all of the students who were apparently sitting at what was formally designated as the "Gryffindor table". "Oh, yes, introductions. My name is Sir Nicholas de Mimsy-Porpington at your service."

Harry promptly cleared his throat and spoke directly to the ghost. "Pardon me, Sir Nicholas, but we haven't been Sorted yet - the first-year students, I mean - and the Sorting Ceremony won't take place until tomorrow morning."

"Oh," replied Sir Nicholas as he was slightly taken aback by the news. "But you're all sitting at the Gryffindor table, aren't you?"

Potter shrugged at his question. "I suppose so, yes," he remarked bluntly.

"Hello, Sir Nicholas," greeted Percy casually. "Did you have a pleasant summer?"

"Rather quite dismal, actually," said Sir Nicholas irritably. "Yet once again, my request to join the Headless Hunt has been denied."

"I know who you are!" Ron piped-up suddenly as he turned to look at Sir Nicholas' ghost. "My brothers have told me all about you - you're Nearly Headless Nick!"

"I would _prefer_ that you call me Sir Nicholas, thank you," the ghost responded stiffly to the redhead's comment.

"_Nearly_ Headless?" a sandy-haired little boy named Seamus Finnigan asked curiously, who was in fact the same little boy that sat with Harry, Ron, and Neville in the small boat which had taken them across the lake to the castle. "How can you be _Nearly_ Headless?"

Sir Nicholas looked extremely miffed, as if their little chat wasn't going at all the way he wanted.

"Like _this,_" he said irritably. He immediately seized hold of his left ear and pulled, with his whole head promptly swinging off his neck and falling onto his shoulder as though it were on a hinge. Someone had obviously tried to behead him, albeit not very well. And upon looking rather pleased at the stunned expressions on the students' faces, he then swung his head back up onto his neck, coughed, and said "So, be seeing you all at the Sorting Ceremony tomorrow morning then, I suppose. Yes?"

Harry, Ron, Neville, and all of the other first-years who were sitting at the "Gryffindor table" nodded silently in response.

"Um, excuse me, Sir?" exclaimed Seamus, who was looking at Nearly Headless Nick and clearly wanting to ask the ghost something. "Who is that ghost over there at the far table?"

Nearly Headless Nick briefly glanced over at the horrible ghost who was sitting right next to Malfoy with blankly staring eyes, a gaunt face, and robes which were stained with silver blood. Draco, as it appeared, didn't look all too pleased with the current seating arrangements.

"Oh, that's the Bloody Baron," said Nearly Headless Nick, as he turned back to face Seamus. "He's the resident Slytherin ghost. I do so hope that whichever of you first-years gets Sorted into Gryffindor will help us win the House Championship this year. Gryffindors have never gone so long without winning, you know. Slytherin House has taken the Cup six years in a row now! And that barmy git is becoming almost unbearable because of it!"

"How did he get all covered in blood?" Seamus inquired with great interest.

"I've never asked," answered Nearly Headless Nick delicately before floating off. He then promptly turned around again to look direction at Seamus. "And that's "_Sir Nicholas_" not "_Sir_", my boy," he politely corrected the little boy, with Seamus nodding understandably in reply.

As everyone was busy eating, conversations began to arise concerning the students families and home-lives.

"So, what's your family like, Seamus?" asked Neville curiously.

"I'm half-and-half," replied Seamus. "Dad's a Muggle. Mum's a witch, and she didn't tell him until after they were married. Sure was a bit of a nasty shock for him when he finally found out about it, though."

Everyone around the table instantly laughed at his funny comment.

"What about you, Harry?" the little boy asked the Padawan directly with a very curious expression on his face. "Where have you been all this time?"

Potter looked up at Seamus upon taking the last bite of his food, before carefully chewing and then swallowing it. The other students around the table started asking him similar questions, though before he could answer even one of their many inquiries, the remains of what was left-over on everyone's plates vanished almost as quickly as when the food had first appeared; leaving them sparkling clean just as before. And a moment later, the desserts appeared exactly in the same way as the food which the students had just now finished eating, leaving nearly every one of the first-year's mouths watering greatly as all eyes were staring hungry at the blocks of ice cream, apple pies, treacle tarts, chocolate éclairs, and many, many more deliciously-looking desserts galore.

The students, including Seamus, must have instantly forgotten about asking Harry so many questions, as they were now too busy chowing down on their most favorite and yummy treats. And once more, Harry mentally advised all of the first-years at all four of the tables not to eat too much all at once, lest they risk getting rather unpleasant stomach aches as well as headaches due to them scarfing down on the frozen desserts (_or just any of the desserts in general_), with a large number of the students in turn not surprisingly ignoring the hint regarding the sweets.

Once everyone was either full or stuffed, Professor Dumbledore got to his feet again. The majority of students in the Hall fell silent, apart from those who had obviously overeaten themselves, as their moans, groans, whimpers, and whines could clearly be heard echoing throughout the large room.

"Ahem," the Headmaster expressed loudly, clearing his throat. "Now that we are all fed and watered, it's high-time for everyone to get some shuteye. There's a really, _VERY_ big day ahead of all of you tomorrow. Professor Filius Flitwick, who is the Head of Ravenclaw House, will show the first-year students to their temporary rooms for tonight. So, now, off to bed with you lot!"

The first-year students who had unfortunately eaten _way_ too much dessert all started whimpering and whining even louder now, with a few of them even tearing-up and then gradually crying in pain due to their upset stomachs and/or pounding headaches. And it was no surprise that Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle were undoubtedly among those bunch.

Shaking her head, Professor McGonagall looked over to her left at an elderly woman (_who was glancing over at her in turn_) dressed in old-style nurse's clothing and gestured with a nod to her, with the woman immediately rising from her seat at the High Table and making her way to each of the first-years who weren't feeling well; slowly gathering them together in a group and gently herding them all towards the entrance doors of the Great Hall.

The little girl with short black hair, who sat in the boat along with Parvati, Padma, and the redheaded little girl whom Harry had previously comforted earlier just outside of the Great Hall, was crying so much that she doubled over in agonizing pain from her upset stomach and miserable headache, albeit most likely from eating too much of the _frozen_ desserts.

"OW, OW, OW, OW, OW! IT HURTS TOO MUCH!" she wailed in agony, before partially curling-up into a semi-fetal position on the floor. "I WANT MY MUMMY!"

A small minority of the students who hadn't overstuffed themselves looked on at what was happening as they uttered soft and gentle expressive noises of sympathetic pity towards the suffering child; wanting in some way to help her, but stayed where they were since they didn't think that they were allowed to, while more students on the other hand glanced at one another and started whispering back and forth amongst themselves.

Harry, meanwhile, had immediately gotten up from his seat at the "Gryffindor table" and silently walked over to where the dark-haired little girl was laying in agony on the Hall floor to try to both help and comfort her, but only after he had looked over towards the High Table at both Professor Dumbledore as well as Professor McGonagall for their approval, to which the Headmaster nodded with both a smile and a twinkle in his eye, while McGonagall gave a briefly warm smile of her own before nodding her approval also, and Potter in turn graciously mouthing the words "_thank you_" to them in gratitude.

Upon approaching the spot where the little girl was half curled-up on the floor, with the elder woman herself about to lift the crying child up into her arms and carry her to the Hospital Wing, Potter crouched down on his knees and the little girl slowly looked up at him as he held out his hand towards her, offering to help her get on her feet. And once the child took Harry's hand, she steadily and a bit painfully got to her feet while continuing to cry: her tears flowing down the sides of her face.

Not wanting to see her or any of the others suffer the way that they were, Harry momentarily and gently embraced the little girl in a warm and caring hug, before slowly pulling away again. As he did so, the little girl all of sudden began to feel a little better, as the pain of both her stomachache as well as her headache, had somewhat diminished. While at the same time, Harry whispered comforting words into her ear; telling her that it was going to be okay.

"Th- Thank you," the little girl said with a small sob.

Harry nodded with a compassionate smile. "You're welcome," he replied graciously. He immediately turned to look up at the elder woman dressed in nurse's clothes who promptly spoke directly to him.

"What was that, Potter?" she asked in a confused tone of voice. "What did you do?"

"I took away some of the pain from both her headache and her stomachache," answered Harry.

He then looked back at the little girl and politely asked what her name was, with her giving it as Pansy Parkinson. Potter turned his head to look at the elder woman once again, and asked her permission to come along to the Hospital Wing, as he wanted to try and help the other children who were also in pain from overeating too much of the desserts.

The elder woman (_who went by the name of Madam Pomfrey_) kindly obliged the little boy's request even though she was far more than capable of tending to the children herself, but only after having looked over at the High Table to Dumbledore and McGonagall both for their consent, to which they agreed.

As he watched his friend leave the Great Hall with Madam Pomfrey and the other students to go to the Hospital Wing, wondering why he was even going along with them to begin with, Ron grimaced-up his face in a bitterly jealous expression that was most likely directed towards Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle specifically.

'_I hope Harry doesn't even think about helping or trying to befriend those vile snakes!_' Ron thought inwardly to himself as he watched in distaste as Potter stepped through the entrance doors of the Great Hall, and out into the corridor.

Harry must have sensed this, because he all of a sudden momentarily turned to look over at Ron with a rather particularly stern expression that seemed most unsettling to the redhead, which in turn made Weasley blush and then slunk down low in offense.

The rest of the first-year students who hadn't needed to go to the Hospital Wing followed Professor Flitwick (_who was a dwarfish-looking half-goblin and half-human cross-breed_) out of the Great Hall, and through several hallways and corridors (_including an area of the castle with what was known as the Grand Staircase, which rose-up to seven stories high and constantly moved back and forth between adjoining corridors, with a number of the steps often rising or falling out of position on some of the staircases, while other steps simply disappeared altogether_), until they came to a two-way corridor where a pair of intricately designed doors mysteriously appeared before them.

"Right," said Professor Flitwick. "Here we are, everyone. This will be where you stay for tonight, until you are all Sorted into your own Houses tomorrow, of course. In you go, now."

All of the students slowly stepped forward as the double doors gradually opened up to reveal a lavishly adorned bed chamber which had a large number of both boy and girl beds inside it, as well as several nightstands (_one in-between each bed_), and came complete with a bunch of adjoining bathrooms also.

Ron, Neville, and the Patil twins all gazed around the room in sheer wonder and amazement, as did all of the other first-year students upon them stepping inside. And upon looking around a little more closely, they all noticed several trunks, each with their own names on them, carefully placed in a designated area of the room.

"Well, this is where I leave you all," the Professor added bluntly. "I will be back first thing in the morning to take you all to the Sorting Ceremony in the Great Hall. So, be up and ready to go by seven-thirty exactly. Goodnight!"

With that, the doors closed behind Professor Flitwick as he waddled out of the room, leaving all of the remaining first-years alone.

As everyone went about getting themselves ready for bed, Ron started to wonder if Harry was planning on joining them and whether or not Professor Flitwick was in fact heading directly over to the Hospital Wing to fetch him straight away, or if Potter was going to decide to stay with the other students in the Hospital Wing for the night, the latter of which the redhead had seriously hoped wasn't the case.


	11. Ch 10 - A Rather Strange Sort (Year 1)

Author's Note: This chapter is now fully up and ready to view. Please read and review. But also, let me know of any writing mistakes within it. Thanks.

* * *

**Chapter 10**

**A Rather Strange Sort**

**Year 1 - Hogwarts Castle - Earth**

The next morning, all of the first-year students were up, dressed, and ready just as they were instructed to be the night before. The bunch of students who had either stomachaches and/or headaches, and had been taken to the Hospital Wing by Madam Pomfrey, were also up and out of bed on time. And even though they were feeling a whole lot better from the way they had all previously felt the night before, due to them overeating on the desserts at the start-of-term banquet, a couple students were still a tiny bit bleary-eyed because they hadn't gotten much sleep.

Harry, meanwhile, (_who was currently sitting cross-legged on a spare bed that Madame Pomfrey had made-up for him to sleep in, and quietly meditating_) had decided to stay in the Hospital Wing for the night as well since he had requested of Madam Pomfrey to come along with her and the students in order to help them, which he did so. And yet, it took a wee bit of prodding for Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle to allow Potter to help ease their suffering, before Pomfrey in turn gave each of the children (_except Harry who wasn't feeling sick_) a medical potion which completely quelled their upset stomachs and/or headaches within a few hours after taking it.

A few minutes later, each and everyone of the first-year students who had spent the night in the Hospital Wing, were all being guided towards the Great Hall where the rest of the older student-body as well as the castle staff were all patiently waiting for their arrival so that the Sorting Ceremony could finally take place.

While walking through the many prominent hallways and corridors, Harry couldn't help but notice that Pansy Parkinson was looking over at him through the crowd of people. Upon hanging back, so that other students could pass by and go around him, he slowly made his way to the little girl's position in the ever flowing stream of bodies.

"Hi, Potter," said Parkinson with a slight smile.

"Hi, Parkinson," replied Harry in an equally cheery manner. And the little girl giggled at the thought of both her and Harry addressing each other by their last names, which was funny to her since the letter "_P_" was at the beginning of the two surnames.

As the students approached the corridor where the entrance to the Great Hall was located, the wrest of the first-years who had all spent the night in the hidden chamber all walked into the corridor from the opposite end while being lead in by Professor Flitwick.

Harry immediately noticed Ron standing near to the front of the group opposite him. And upon looking around a bit more, he then spotted Neville and the Patil twins, as well as the little redheaded girl that he had helped the night before (_who's name Potter had learned was Susan Bones_) all standing at the very front of the crowd of children.

Professor McGonagall suddenly appeared in the corridor from the moment that the entry doors that lead into the Great Hall creaked wide-open and then immediately shut closed behind her again just as quickly. She briefly glanced about her at all of the small faces which now congregated the narrowly confining space, making absolutely sure that each and every one of the first-year students were both present and accounted for.

When she was certain that everyone was here, McGonagall nodded her head as a gesture toward each of the two groups of students; letting them know non-verbally to follow her inside the Great Hall as she then turned around and casually stepped through the entrance doors as they opened-wide once more into the gigantic room.

Upon stepping into the massive hall, the students all looked upward at where the ceiling was supposed to be, only to discover a bright bluish sky that was moderately layered with white clouds of varying shapes and sizes, which were randomly strewn out across the wide upper interior of the grand chamber.

As Harry looked on in complete awe and wonder, it was hard to believe that there was even a ceiling at all, and that the Great Hall itself didn't just simply open-up and stretch all the way out into reaches of the planet's upper atmosphere, even though Sirius had told him all about the Great Hall and also mentioned it many times before in the stories that his godfather had recounted.

Moments later, everyone was staring up towards the front of the hall where the High Table was situated along with all of the school's Professors and teachers, where Professor McGonagall silently placed a four-legged stool directly in front of the first-year students. And on top of the stool she gently put a pointy and rather mangy-looking old hat, with several patches and stitches. For a few seconds, there was nothing but silence as the first-years all stared curiously at it.

Suddenly, the hat twitched, and a large rip near the brim opened wide like a mouth, with two smaller tears along the center widening to form a pair of slits for "_eyes_" and the hat briefly looked around at the large gathering of students - then it began to sing:

_"Oh, you may not think I'm pretty,_

_But don't judge on what you see,_

_I'll eat myself if you can find_

_A smarter hat than me._

_You can keep your bowlers black,_

_Your top hats sleek and tall,_

_For I'm the Hogwarts Sorting Hat_

_And I can cap them all._

_There's nothing hidden in your head_

_The Sorting Hat can't see,_

_So try me on and I will tell you_

_Where you ought to be._

_You might belong in Gryffindor,_

_Where dwell the brave at heart,_

_Their daring, nerve, and chivalry_

_Set Gryffindors apart;_

_You might belong in Hufflepuff,_

_Where they are just and loyal,_

_Those patient Hufflepuffs are true_

_And unafraid of toil;_

_Or yet in wise old Ravenclaw,_

_If you've a ready mind,_

_Where those of wit and learning,_

_Will always find their kind;_

_Or perhaps in Slytherin_

_You'll make your real friends,_

_Those cunning folk use any means_

_To achieve their ends._

_So put me on! Don't be afraid!_

_And don't get in a flap!_

_You're in safe hands (though I have none)_

_For I'm a Thinking Cap!"_

The entire hall instantly burst into applause and the students cheered as the Sorting Hat finished it's song. And it then promptly bowed to each of the four tables in turn (_including the large gathering of first-years who stood before it_), and then became quite still and silent once more.

Professor McGonagall immediately stepped forward while holding a long roll of parchment in her hand.

"When I call your name, you will come forward," she said, adding, "I will place the Sorting Hat on your head, and you will be sorted into your Houses."

As she partly loosened her grip on the scroll of paper, the lower half instantly fell until it almost hit the floor: quickly unrolling itself before stopping only but a couple inches shy of touching the smooth marble steps.

"Abbott, Hannah!"

A small pink-faced girl with blonde hair and pigtails stumbled forward out of the cluster of first-years and nervously approached the stool, before slowly turning around and sitting right down on it just as the Deputy Headmistress gently put the hat on top of her head, which fell right down over her eyes. A moment passed by before-

"HUFFLEPUFF!" shouted the hat.

The table on the inner most right side with the older school students all sitting on both sides instantly cheered and clapped as the little girl hopped down from the stool and went over to sit down with her new classmates at the Hufflepuff table. And Harry immediately saw the Fat Friar (_who was the resident Hufflepuff House ghost_) wave merrily at her, to whom she cheerfully waved back in greeting the instant she noticed him.

"Bones, Susan!"

Susan Bones gently swallowed inwards, trying desperately to suppress her anxieties as she nervously made her way up the steps toward the stool, almost tripping on one of them in the process as she went, but managed to recover her footing in time to keep from falling over onto her face and hurting herself.

"Hmm. Where shall I put you?" said the hat, the moment it was on her head. A few moments passed by as it searched the little girl's mind. "Let's see. I know… HUFFLEPUFF!"

Everyone cheered as Susan jumped down from the stool and scuttled off to sit beside Hannah at the Hufflepuff table.

While the Sorting Hat was busy with Susan, Potter all of a sudden began to hear the same tiny voice of the baby whom he had heard that one night over at the Burrow awhile back. The voice was once again pleading and crying for help. Though, as Harry was looking very much confused over still not knowing who that voice was, let alone why he was even hearing it in his mind to begin with, he quickly got an idea in his head of what to do just in case anyone happened to be watching him.

"Ouch!" uttered Harry quietly as he clapped a hand to his head, making it appear to anyone who might be looking in his direction that the lightning scar above his eyebrow was hurting.

"Harry, what is it?" asked Ron in a concerned voice, upon seeing Harry with his right hand on his head.

"N-nothing," Harry answered slowly in a reassuring tone. "Nothing. I'm fine."

"Root, Terry!"

A blonde-haired little boy slowly made his way up the steps and sat down on the stool in front of the others as McGonagall casually placed the hat upon his head, and then-

"RAVENCLAW!"

The table directly in-between Gryffindor and Hufflepuff on the inner left side clapped and cheered this time; several Ravenclaws stood up to shake hands with Terry as he joined them.

"_Brocklehurst, Mandy_" also went to Ravenclaw House along with "_Corner, Michael_", "_Goldstein, Anthony_", "_MacDougal, Isobel_", "_Li, Sue_", and "_Turpin, Lisa_" as well, while "Brown, Lavender" became the first new Gryffindor, and the Gryffindor table (_which was the table on the far left_) exploded with cheers; Harry and Ron both could see Fred and George making catcalls.

"_Bulstrode, Millicent_" then became the first Slytherin of the new school-year, as well as "_Zabini, Blaise_", "_Davis, Tracey_", "_Accrington, Zoe_", "_Parkinson, Pansy_", "_Nott, Theodore_", and last but not least "_Malfoy, Draco._"

"Finch-Fletchley, Justin!" called Professor McGonagall as she read off the name of a dark-brown haired little boy on the scroll.

"HUFFLEPUFF!"

Sometimes the hat shouted out the appropriate House for the person who was wearing it at once, while at other times it took a little while for the hat to decide, as Harry had undoubtedly noticed with "_Finnigan, Seamus_" who had momentarily glanced up at Potter a tad nervously (_who in turn gave him a reassuring nudge forward as he gently smiled down at the smaller boy_) before taking his place on the stool; and sat there for almost a full minute before the hat declared-

"GRYFFINDOR!"

When Neville Longbottom was called up, he half-confidently and half-fearfully made his way up to the stool, before turning and sitting down. _What would the hat decide? Which of the Houses would he be sorted into?_ He desperately hoped with all of his might that it wouldn't be Slytherin, but he also hoped less-so that it wasn't Ravenclaw, since he didn't feel that he was particularly clever or witty enough for their liking. Plus, the hat took a rather long time to decide on his behalf. Then, finally, after nearly five whole minutes the hat shouted-

"GRYFFINDOR!"

Longbottom practically leapt off the stool and ran directly over to the Gryffindor table, thus barely giving McGonagall any time at all to remove the hat from his head, as the little boy was looking rather elated at having been sorted into Gryffindor.

"Moon, Lily!"

"HUFFLEPUFF!"

"_Patil, Parvati_" ended up in Gryffindor, while her twin sister "_Patil, Padma_" was sorted into Ravenclaw, and "_Perks, Sally-Anne_" was sorted into Hufflepuff House. Then it was Ron's turn to be sorted, and for all intents and purposes, he was looking a rather light shade of pale-green by now; appearing as though he was about to hurl. Harry crossed his fingers as the redhead sat uncomfortably down on the stool.

"Ha! Another Weasley," the hat exclaimed from the instant McGonagall had lowered it onto his head. "I know just what to do with you. GRYFFINDOR!"

Harry clapped loudly along with everyone at the Gryffindor table as Ron literally collapsed into his seat right next to Parvati. And then, "Thomas, Dean," a black boy who was even taller than Ron promptly joined them moments later at the table after being sorted into Gryffindor too.

"Well done, Ron, excellent," said Percy Weasley rather pompously from across the table the moment Ronald sat down.

And then, the moment which everyone had been anxiously waiting for had at long last come. The sorting of one-

"Potter, Harry!"

As Harry quietly stepped forward and took his place on the stool, whispers suddenly broke out like little hissing fires all over the hall amongst every one of the students, from first-years all the way up to seventh-years.

"_Harry Potter._"

"_I wonder which House he'll be in._"

"_I sure hope that it's Gryffindor._"

"_I'm betting it'll be Ravenclaw. He certainly seems clever enough._"

The only thing Harry could make out were the shoulders on the nearest column of students that were seated at all four tables as the brim of the Sorting Hat stretched out for several inches, thereby obscuring the little boy's view of everyone who was either watching him, or who were all craning their necks to get a good look at him for themselves.

"Hmm," said a small voice in his ear, and Harry recognized it to be the hat's at once. "Difficult. Most difficult. Plenty of courage, I see. And a rather talented mind at that. You have a very strong drive to succeed, I can tell. You would make a fine Slytherin to be sure."

'_Not Slytherin. Not Slytherin,_' Harry thought over and over again in his mind. '_Anything but Slytherin._'

"Not Slytherin, eh?" replied the Sorting Hat. "It's all right here, inside your-" Suddenly, the hat fell silent for a brief instant. "Wait, what is this I see? What?!"

Everyone at all four of the tables looked back and forth at one another curiously, as they could all see that Professor McGonagall was suddenly looking nervous for some strange reason. And as she apparently turned around to throw a worried glance at Albus Dumbledore, the whole student-body began whispering amongst themselves the moment they noticed the Headmaster's tense expression as well.

"**_THAT'S IMPOSSIBLE__‼_**" the Sorting Hat unexpectedly bellowed loudly, causing all of the students (_including Harry_) to jump in their seats with alarm.

All of a sudden, Harry could hear a loud chorus of dismayed gasps all coming from the students across all four of the tables, as he could both see and feel the hat slowly turning on his head, yet had absolutely no clue as to what was going on, or even _why_ it was doing what it was doing. Then he could faintly hear all of the students now whispering among one another anew, though a bit quieter than before. Finally, he couldn't stand it any longer, and subsequently reached up with his right hand and flicked what was technically the back-end of the Sorting Hat (_given that it's face was turned in Professor McGonagall's immediate direction_); making it yelp in surprise, before turning back to face forward again and then lean over slightly, as through it were looking Potter in the eyes rather gruffly.

'_Hey, what is going on up there?_' the little boy demanded sharply. '_Are you going to sort me or what, already?_'

"Urgh!" the Sorting Hat grumbled "_under it's breath_" quite rather bluntly in utter disgust. "Very well, then… _Potter!_" it then groaned in reply.

After searching the little boy's head once more for a bit longer, it finally yelled in a loud voice-

"GRYFFINDOR!"

The moment the Sorting Hat was removed from Harry's head, he jumped down off the stool and sprinted towards the Gryffindor table as a thunderous chorus of ecstatic cheers and clapping hands erupted from the students there as he took a seat right next to Dean Thomas, while the Weasley twins proudly yelled, "We got Potter! We got Potter!" over and over again.

**_WACK!_**

Just at that moment, Harry heard a noise from up near the front along with sharp yelp from Professor McGonagall and he turned to see that the Sorting Hat was for some reason fiercely _assaulting_ the Deputy Headmistress. And upon seeing this, Potter jumped up from where he was sitting at the table and lunged for the hat; promptly snatching it out of the air just as McGonagall had released her grip on it in reaction and complete surprise to it unexpectedly smacking at her hand.

"Hey, stop that!" chided Harry sharply. "What is wrong with you? Why are you hitting the Professor like that?"

**_WACK!_**

The hat didn't answer, but instead, smacked Harry across the face which caused the little boy to stumble backwards in sheer surprise and slight shock, before vanishing into thin air with a pop.

"Bloody impostor!" the Sorting Hat uttered before vanishing from the Great Hall entirely, while Harry accidentally missed a step as he stumbled back from the blow. But instead of tumbling head over heels down the marble steps, Potter rather quite suddenly leapt off his feet, and to the astonished amazement of everyone in the gigantic room, back-flipped across the small landing and did a full one-eighty degree turn of his body before nailing a perfect three-pointer on his feet.

The entire student-body literally exploded into a frenzy of ecstatic cheers and clapped their hands upon witnessing the amazing feat of which "_The-Boy-Who-Lived_" had just now preformed before their very eyes, right as the little boy got to a standing position, before lowering his eyes in a slightly brief pang of embarrassment upon seeing what was happening in front of him, as it hadn't been his intention to showoff like that.

And as the day progressed onward, Harry's mind was continuously reeling with questions as to why the Sorting Hat was acting the way that it had been when it was his turn to be sorted, and also why the hat had assaulted Professor McGonagall as it had done so, but also why all of the other students were so hushed-up about whatever it was they had witnessed while he was under the hat, and why none of them would talk to him about it.

Harry needed answers. And he surely hoped that he could in fact get at least some of those answers from the only other person that he knew had gone to school at Hogwarts many years before.

_Sirius Black._


	12. Ch 11 - Flubbed Flying Lesson (Year 1)

Author's Note: This chapter is now FINALLY up! Let me know of any writing errors in the '_Review_' section below.

* * *

**Chapter 11**

**Flubbed Flying Lesson**

**Year 1 - Hogwarts Castle - Earth**

Over the following week, Harry was slowly becoming acclimated to his new surroundings, both inside and outside of the castle. The lessons he'd had with Professors McGonagall, Flitwick, as well as a dumpy little witch named Professor Pomona Sprout (_who was Head of Hufflepuff House_), had all been quite intriguing. But it was Potions classes, however, that had come off as rather unpleasant and distasteful to him. For it wasn't the lessons themselves, but rather, the person who was teaching them that was the problem: Professor Severus Snape - Head of Slytherin House.

Snape was a rather thinly-built man, with sallow skin, a large hooked nose, and yellow uneven teeth. He usually dressed in flowing black robes which made him resemble "_an overgrown bat_" as both of the Weasley twins would say. He also had shoulder-length, greasy black hair which framed his face in curtains, as well as curling lips and dark, penetrating eyes that resembled tunnels.

At the start-of-term banquet, Harry had gotten it into his head that Professor Snape disliked him from the very moment he had laid eyes on the young Padawan Learner. And by the end of the very first Potions lesson, the little boy knew almost immediately that he'd been wrong. Severus Snape didn't just dislike Harry - the Potions Master absolutely _hated_ him.

The class that everyone had been looking forward to, though, was Defense Against The Dark Arts, which was taught by a pale young man with a twitching eye. He looked _very_ nervous, and the students all noticed that he had a rather awkward stutter when he spoke.

"G-G-G-Gather round, c-c-class," he said shakily. "M-M-My name is P-P-Processor Quirrell."

While the initial start of the first Defense Against The Dark Arts class seemed promising enough, all of the students soon began to realize that the Professor's lessons on the subject had turned out to be a bit of a joke. His classroom smelled strongly of garlic, which everyone had said was to ward off a vampire that Quirrell had met in Romania, and was afraid would be coming for him sooner or later, when Harry had asked why that was exactly.

The turban, which Quirrell was apparently _always_ wearing, had been given to him by an African prince as a _thank-you_ for getting rid of a troublesome zombie as he had told them, but the students weren't sure they believed his story at all, due in part of the fact that when Seamus asked eagerly to hear of how the Professor had fought off the zombie, Quirrell immediately went pink and began randomly spouting-off about the weather outside.

Easily, the class that all of the students had been dreading was History of Magic; taught by a ghost named Professor Cuthbert Binns, who had died in his sleep while resting comfortably in an armchair that was situated in front of a crackling fireplace in one of the staff rooms of the castle.

On the last day of their first week of classes, Harry, Ron, and Neville all found their way down to the Great Hall for breakfast without so much as getting lost even once, as the three boys had by now managed to successfully navigate their way from the Common Room to the main gathering area of the school after ruffly four days of trial and error. Though, many other first-year students were _still_ having trouble finding their own way around the place, and Harry offered to help them whenever possible.

While eating their bowls of porridge, Ron looked at Harry and was just about to ask him a question, when suddenly the mail arrived. Harry and many of the other first-year students had gotten used to the way in which the mail had come by now; as about a hundred or more owls had swooped into the Great Hall each and every morning at breakfast, without any sort of warning from either the Professors, nor the Headmaster, or even the older students for that matter, and circled the four tables until they saw their respective owners, before dropping letters and packages onto their laps.

Hedwig hadn't brought Harry any mail or packages so far, which Potter fully expected since there wasn't really anyone on Earth who knew him at all, apart from Hagrid, the Weasleys, the Lovegoods, and the Longbottoms, of course. But the little boy was certain that none of _them_ knew him well enough to be sending him anything as of yet. On this morning, however, he would come to find out just how wrong he was; as Hedwig had gracefully fluttered down in-between the marmalade jar and the sugar bowl, and promptly dropped a note onto Harry's empty plate.

Tearing it open, Harry read the note, which said in a rather untidy scrawl:

'_Dear Harry, I know you get Friday afternoons off, so would you like to come and have a cup of tea with  
me around __three? I want to hear all about your first week. Send us an answer back with Hedwig._'

'_Hagrid._'

Upon reading the note, Harry asked if he could borrow Ron's quill for a moment, to which Ron obliged. And after quickly scribbling a short reply message down on the back of the note, Potter then sent the note off with his owl back to the half-giant's hut straightaway.

At around five minutes to three, Harry left the castle and made his way across the grounds over to Hagrid's hut. Ron, Neville, and the Patil twins had all asked the young Padawan Learner if they could come with him, and Potter happily obliged their request to do so.

Just as the lot were swiftly approaching the front steps that lead up to the doorway, they all suddenly stopped in their tracks and looked around them as well as up towards the sky, while the front door to the hut casually opened wide and Hagrid himself ventured outside of his lodgings, curious to know what was going on: as a distantly loud dooming noise was immediately heard from somewhere high above them.

Harry thought it sounded very much like a sonic boom going off, given what Josh had told him about Earth and it's vast history (_as well as many other things about it_) over the course of the last month and a half that they'd gotten to know each other while at the Jedi Temple on Coruscant. But the young Jedi also told Potter many more rather curious and fascinating things concerning Earth (_and none of it concerning the Wizarding World in any way_), which he had both discovered and learned about in the last twelve years of him "_growing up all over again_", while they were staying at the Burrow.

And, speak of the devil, Varner all of a sudden appeared from practically out of nowhere and landed a solid three-pointer only but few yards away from the half-giant's hut. He was once again clothed in his Jedi robes, tunic, and boots, with his lightsaber hanging from his utility belt.

The kids all promptly turned to look in the Jedi Knight's direction just as he straightened into a upright standing position.

"Hey, Josh!" exclaimed Harry a bit surprised. "What are you doing here?"

"I came by to see you about something, Harry," the young Jedi Knight answered as he casually strode over towards the small group. "Is it alright if I come in with them, Hagrid?"

"Of course, Josh. You're most certainly welcome to come inside," replied Hagrid. "I was just about to make some tea."

Josh smiled warmly. "Thanks, but I'm afraid I won't be staying long," he replied bluntly.

Harry looked directly at his "_mentor_" disconcertingly. "What? Why not?" he asked in a rather unsettling tone of voice.

"I'll tell you once we're inside, Harry," said Varner as he gently nudged both Potter and the other children into the hut.

A few minutes later, Josh sat down with Harry and explained to him that the Jedi Council had contacted him with an urgent message to return to Coruscant and the Jedi Temple at once: stating that it had something to do with an attempt made on Senator Padmé Amidala's life, and that fortunately for her, the move to assassinate the Senator had failed. But the Council didn't yet know who was behind it.

Upon hearing this, Harry got a peculiar look on his face as if he had heard that name before. And when commenting to Varner about the name sounding familiar to him, Josh revealed that Padmé Amidala was one of the people whom the little boy had encountered when the Jedi had taken Potter back to Coruscant with them as a baby a decade earlier, along with two other youths named Anakin Skywalker and Kitster Banai.

"I was going to tell you about both Anakin and Padmé right before-" the Jedi Knight started to say, before suddenly being cut-off by Harry.

"No. No, it's much more than that," Potter interrupted abruptly, causing Varner to silently mouth "_…you interrupted me_" while rolling his eyes in annoyance. "I feel as though I…"

Suddenly, the little boy's vision warped and shifted as the hut around him faded and was instantly replaced by the sight of three very young people looming directly over him, one of whom was a young girl clad in red; her legs tucked firmly together underneath her while sitting on the floor, and the other was a little boy with sandy-blonde hair. The third individual was yet another little boy with black hair that he didn't quite recognize as well as the other two occupants in the strange room. And although he didn't rightly know either of them, there was _still_ something which was oddly familiar about the little boy and young girl who appeared nearest to him, yet he couldn't figure out what or why.

The three individuals were all smiling down at him and Harry instantly got the sensation that he was being held by someone, and almost immediately saw that it was in fact the young girl who was holding him within her arms like a…_baby_. He suddenly realized that he was experiencing a Force Vision of when he was a baby, and that this was actually Padmé Amidala herself who was cradling him in her arms. The other two individuals must have been Anakin Skywalker and Kitster Banai respectively, both who's names Josh had mentioned only a moment ago.

About a moment later, the Force Vision began to swirl and fade away as Harry found himself standing in Hagrid's hut once again, though not before Potter had thought that he had distinctly heard his little toddler-self exclaim the words "_Mama_" and "_Dada_" to both Padmé and Anakin while glancing up at both of them.

"Harry! Harry!" Josh exclaimed while lightly shaking Potter back to his senses. "Are you alright?"

"I… had a vision. It was a vision of those three people - Padmé, Anakin, and Kitster - whom you just spoke of," said Harry in stunned bewilderment.

Before anyone could say anything more, Josh suddenly heard a small beeping noise emanating from somewhere on his utility belt. Upon excusing himself from the others, the young Jedi Knight quietly stepped outside of the hut for a moment, while Harry in turn began to explain what exactly he had see and experienced within his vision.

"Blimey, Harry!" exclaimed Hagrid in a shocked tone of voice from the moment he'd heard what the little boy had said concerning what his toddler-self had uttered to both Anakin and Padmé in the vision. "Why would you say something like that? Especially to people whom you've never met. Lily and James are your mum and dad, not-"

"I- I know. I know, Hagrid. I know," said Harry while holding up his hand, promptly stopping the half-giant from speaking any further. "I just can't for the life of me figure out why these things are starting to happen, is all. I mean, first the Sorting Hat acting the way that it did, and now this? I really need-"

"Harry!" Josh called from the other end of the hut, just as a door was heard closing. "Harry, I gotta go. Master Yoda just contacted me from the Temple. They're wanting me back there asap. Now, I know that you've got your schooling at Hogwarts to focus on, but I also know that the Council granted me permission to further your lessons in Jedi training, so I brought this along with me just in case you might need to use it as an alternative method of study and practice for your training."

Varner then reached into his robes and extracted a cube-shaped device which was blue in color; immediately holding it out in his palm for Harry to see. And as the others slowly gathered around in awe and wonder upon noticing the strange cube-like object, Potter looked up at his "_Master_" in total surprise.

"What is it?" asked Ron quite curiously. "Harry, what is that thing? It looks…_weird._"

The object suddenly began to rise up into the air out of Varner's palm, and then steadily moved towards Harry's outstretched hands, before it gently lowered down into the little boy's cupped palms.

"It's a Jedi Holocron," answered Harry. "Sort of a learning tool for Jedi at the Temple on Coruscant. Although, as I understand it, the Holocrons inside Temple Archives are only meant for Jedi Masters."

"That is correct, Harry," Josh asserted directly. "The ones at the Temple are strictly meant for Jedi Masters only. But this - this is my own personal Holocron that I created while we were on Coruscant. I want you to study it's teachings carefully while I'm away."

Harry nodded understandably. "Yes… _Master._"

Josh smirked at the little boy's response, and then turned to walk towards the front door of Hagrid's hut, only to promptly turning back around again; reaching inside his robes a second time as he did so, thus retrieving a skeleton key which was partially similar in design and appearance to the one which Varner had used on the Weasley's garage door lock just days earlier.

"Oh, and you may need this also," he stated casually, while holding up the key for Harry to take from him. "I made it for you to use whenever you needed to get from one place to another instantaneously. Just…don't use it if and when you absolutely don't _need_ to. Clear?"

Harry nodded again; excepting the key from the Jedi Knight and stuffing it carefully into his school robes for temporary safekeeping until it was time for him, Ron, and Neville to all go back to the boys' dormitory for the night after supper. And before doing so that very evening, while all of the Gryffindor students had a bit of free-time left on their hands to do whatever they wanted _after_ classes, yet _before_ heading off to the Great Hall for mealtime and then directly to bed thereafter, they all gathered around in the Common Room, curious to see what it was that Harry had brought back with him after returning from Hagrid's earlier in the day.

"What is it, Harry?" asked Dean rather eagerly.

"Please show it to us, Harry!" declared Seamus with near-overwhelming excitement while gently bounding up and down on his tiptoes. "_Please! Please! Please! Please! Please!_"

"Alright, everyone," said Harry with a small laugh at their restlessness. "Settle down now."

The young Padawan Learner then proceeded to reach inside his robes and slowly extracted the Holocron. Everyone's mouths dropped wide-open all at once in total awe and wonder upon seeing the blue-colored box for the first time. All except for Ron, Neville, and the Patil sisters, since they themselves had seen the cube earlier that day when Josh had presented it to Harry shortly before the young Jedi had left to go back to wherever it was that both he and Harry had come from.

A moment later, the box suddenly began to levitate up into the air out of Harry's hand: the four tiny triangular-shaped corners of the cube seemingly detaching themselves and steadily moving out away from the main part of it as they gently rotated continuously in mid-air, and almost immediately a gigantic shimmering image of what looked like the whole of the cosmos, which was primarily glowing a dim bluish color with many other colors representing various cosmic and planetary bodies intertwined within it, appeared directly over their heads.

"_Wow!_" exclaimed Ron in sheer amazement upon looking upwards at the star map. "Is that what this… _thing_ does?"

Harry smiled. "It's a holographic image of this galaxy, Ron," he stated to the redhead. "Through the Force, the Jedi are able to take mental images of things they've seen, people they've met, places they've visited, along with many other things, and store that information and knowledge directly into these boxes. They can even mentally record other stuff such as messages from themselves that are meant for someone else to hear into the Holocrons too."

"Can _you_ do that, Harry?" asked Dean.

Potter shook his head. "I'm afraid not, Dean. Only a Jedi Master would possess the skills needed to do something like that. Although, there have been a few Jedi Knights, such as Varner apparently, who do seem to have the skills that are necessary to accomplish that feat."

Over the next couple of hours, Potter sifted through the Holocron, slowly explaining things about the Force, the Jedi, and several other tidbits of info to the other students, while also being careful to only recount basic areas of knowledge that the others could both grasp and understand. But the little boy was also especially careful and very cautious not to delve into any areas of information and knowledge that would most certainly be otherwise considered strictly forbidden to any and all Padawan Learners, such as himself; information and knowledge that Harry was absolutely certain was embedded deep within the Holocron.

The following day, which was the first Saturday of the first weekend of school for the students, Harry decided to spend it studying the Holocron as much as he could. Some of the other students had even politely asked if they could participate in the lessons alongside him, as they were still very eager to learn many more things from the cube-shaped device, to which Potter obliged their request, but on the very strict condition that he alone would be the one to choose which subjects to study and learn from.

Sunday was also more of the same, though on this particular day, Harry chose instead to study more of the subjects which applied to Hogwarts schooling, rather than Jedi training. And he had also encouraged the other students in Gryffindor to study as much as possible, especially if they had any chance at all of winning the House Cup this year for Gryffindor House at the end-of-term banquet; a special event which Potter had learned about while overhearing a few students from Slytherin talking about it.

Over the following week, Harry had been anticipating what it was going to be like to fly on a broomstick since he had looked at the class schedule for the upcoming week, and saw that the first flying lessons would be starting on Thursday with Madam Rolanda Hooch out in the courtyard. But when he noticed who would be participating in the class along with all the other first-year Gryffindor students, he groaned.

"Typical," said Potter a bit darkly, more to himself than to anyone else around him who had also groaned when they too had noticed who would be participating in the first flying class listed on the schedule for the upcoming week. "_Absolutely typical._ Just what I've always wanted. To make an utter fool of myself while learning how to fly on a broomstick in front of Malfoy and the other first-year Slytherins."

Several students who had been standing close beside him unanimously agreed on that fact, but Ron who had been standing shoulder-to-shoulder with him, gave Harry a encouraging look.

"You don't know that you'll make a fool of yourself, Harry," the redhead expressed reasonably enough. "Anyway, I know for a fact that Malfoy's always going on and on about how good he is at playing Quidditch, but I bet that's all talk."

Ron was most certainly right about one thing though; Malfoy did seem to blabber on quite an awful lot about how much of an expert he was at flying, and that he didn't need to be taught some pathetically dull and pointless flying lessons. He would then tell long boastful stories that always seemed to end with him narrowly escaping Muggles in large flying vehicles called helicopters. And he wasn't the only one ether: as Seamus told it, he'd spent most of his childhood zooming around the countryside on his broomstick. Even Ron himself would tell anyone who'd listen to him about the time he'd almost collided with a hang glider in mid-flight on Charlie's old broomstick.

Everyone from wizarding families talked incessantly about Quidditch, and frankly… it was beginning to get on Harry's nerves.

When the day finally came for them to begin their flying lessons with Madam Hooch, all three boys headed down to the Great Hall for breakfast as usual and met both Parvati and Padma in one of the adjoining corridors that lead directly to the grand chamber; greeting one another casually as they walked towards the huge entry doors to the hall. Several moments later, while everyone was quietly eating their breakfasts, the mail arrived.

Harry hadn't received anything apart from Hagrid's note the week before, something that Malfoy had been quick to notice, of course. And Malfoy's eagle owl was always bringing him packages of sweets from home, which he opened gloatingly at the Slytherin table.

"Didn't Malfoy get the message about not stuffing his face like that?" asked Ron irritably. "Especially considering what happened the last time?"

After watching Malfoy for a minute or two, Harry shook his head disappointingly. "I guess not," he replied with a distasteful sigh under his breath.

Just then, a barn owl swooped down and brought Neville a small package from his grandmother. He opened it excitedly and showed everyone at the Gryffindor table a glass ball which was the size of a large marble. It appeared to be full of white smoke.

"It's a Rememberall!" explained Neville eagerly. "Gran knows that I _sometimes_ forget things, but only on occasion - this tells you if there's something that you've forgotten."

Shortly before three-thirty that afternoon, Harry, Ron, Neville, Parvati, and the other first-year Gryffindors, along with everyone of the first-year students from Slytherin House, hurried down onto the front steps of the castle, where Madam Hooch (_who had short gray hair and yellow eyes like a hawk_) was waiting for them on the grounds for their first flying lesson.

It was a clear, breezy day, and the grass rippled underneath their feet as they made their way down the sloping lawns towards a smooth, flat lawn just on the opposite side of the grounds which lead directly to the Forbidden Forest, whose trees were swaying darkly in the distance.

Hooch promptly blew a loud whistle that was hanging around her neck, thus causing all of the students to immediately halt in their tracks where they were all standing, as she had been carefully observing that several of the Gryffindor and Slytherin students were pushing and shoving one another as they walked along, with some of them trying to get ahead of the other as they forced their way towards the front of the assembled group. She then sharply instructed them to form into two separate rows, each facing the other.

"Good afternoon, class," she addressed most firmly, once all of the students had done as they were advised. "Welcome to your first flying lesson. Well, what are you all waiting for? Everyone step up to a broomstick. Come on now, hurry up."

All of the students did as they were instructed to do. Harry glanced down at the broom next to his foot. It was rather old and worn, with some of the twigs sticking out at odd angles.

"Stick your right hand over your broom," called Madam Hooch at the front, "and say 'Up!'"

"_UP!_" everyone shouted, the moment they all put their hands out above their broomsticks.

Both Harry and Neville's brooms jumped into their hands instantly, but theirs (_along with a small number of others_) were only some of the few who did. Ron's broom had promptly wacked him right in the nose without any warning, while Parvati had _almost_ managed to get her broom up to where she could grab it before the broom fell back down onto the ground again, but after a couple more tries, Parvati finally succeeded in calling her broomstick to her hand.

The Professor then showed all the students how to correctly mount a broom without sliding off the end of it, before walking up and down each row to both assess and correct the way in which the students were gripping their brooms. And Harry and Ron were both delighted when she told Malfoy that he'd been doing it all wrong for years.

"Now, when I blow my whistle, you kick off from the ground, hard," said Madam Hooch. "Keep your brooms steady, rise a few feet up off the ground and hover a moment, then lean forward slightly and come straight back down. On my whistle - three - two - one!"

Professor Hooch blew her whistle, and Neville, being so excited to start flying, inadvertently shot straight up into the air like a bullet being fired vertically upwards out of a gun; as he had forcefully pushed off the ground with his feet a _little_ TOO FAST…and hard.

"Come back down this instant, boy!" the Professor shouted.

Neville, suddenly realizing what was happening (_as he had noticed that the ground was quickly falling away_) jerked the broomstick forward; angling the end of it downward to halt his rapid ascent.

"Oops," he uttered worriedly to himself before… WHOOSH! The ground that was so very far away down below him, suddenly expanded in size and the amount of distance between both him and it closed within seconds.

"Oh, yeah, he'll fly alright," exclaimed Malfoy with a chuckle to the other Slytherins, while amusingly watching the incident unfold in front of his eyes. "_Just like a rock._"

All of the students in Slytherin House, aside from Pansy Parkinson, began laughing quite rather madly like hyenas at the scene above them, just as-

**_WHAM!_**

A loud thud was instantly heard by all, followed by a nasty crackling, and Neville was suddenly laying face-down in a heap on the ground.

"Neville!" yelled both Harry and Ron in alarm as they immediately rushed over to see whether their friend was hurt or not.

"Both of you, out of the way!" Madam Hooch shouted as she quickly hurried over to check on the little boy's condition. Harry and Ron both backed away from Longbottom immediately in order to let the Professor examine him for any potential injuries. "Oh, dear, it's a broken wrist," she muttered, before discovering that he had also broken several bones in his arm in various places.

Harry and Ron looked at each other in absolute shock at what they had just heard as the Professor gently lifted Neville up onto his feet.

"Ow!" cried Longbottom, as he promptly slumped back down onto the ground in pain. "My ankle!"

Potter immediately came over to his friend's side. "Here, let me help with that," he offered kindly. He then crouched down low to the ground and examined the boy's ankle. "It's seems to be a really bad sprain, is all."

Upon slowly putting his hand on Neville's ankle, Harry used the Force to nullify enough of the pain so that his friend could at least partially walk (_or rather hobble more-less_) on his feet, so that Madam Hooch could gently escort him directly to the Hospital Wing.

While Potter was doing that, however, unbeknownst to nearly everyone there, Longbottom's Rememberall had subsequently fallen out of his robes and landed in the grass.

"None of you are to move while I take Mr. Longbottom to the Hospital Wing!" the Professor warned sharply to all of the students, before slowly and gently taking Neville to the castle. "Understand? You leave those brooms where they are! And if I see even a single one in the air, the student riding it will find themselves out of Hogwarts before they can say '_Quidditch._'"

No sooner were the two of them out of earshot than Malfoy burst out laughing. "Did you see his face?"

Once again, all of the other Slytherins (_except for Parkinson_) joined in, as they too began laughing hysterically.

"Look!" said Malfoy, who darted forward the moment he'd spotted a bright glint of something flashing nearby, close to where Neville had landed. The Rememberall glittered brightly in the sun as he held it up for everyone to see. "It's that stupid thing that Longbottom's gran had gotten him. I bet if the fat lump had given this a squeeze, he would have remembered to fall on his fat ass."

"Give it _here_, Malfoy!" yelled Harry as he strode up to his rival, upon noticing that Draco had Neville's Rememberall in his hand. "_Now!_"

Malfoy turned around to look his rival square in the eye, and smiled nastily. "No! I think I'll leave it somewhere for Longbottom to find - how about - up a tree?"

The blonde-haired boy then immediately leapt onto his broomstick and had taken off like a shot. He hadn't been lying: he _could_ fly well.

"Come and get it, Potter!" he called while circling around the branches of a large oak tree that was nearby.

Weighing his options, along with the warning that Madam Hooch had given just minutes earlier, Harry left his broom on the ground where it was, and immediately bolted straight for Malfoy simply by harnessing Force Speed, followed by a _mistimed_ Force Jump that caught Malfoy completely off-guard; as the Padawan Learner meant to simply snatch the Rememberall from his rival, who ducked at the last second, thus causing Potter to land on the broom and accidentally pushing Draco slightly forward.

Suddenly, without any warning, the broomstick that Draco (_and now Harry_) were both on, began zipping and zooming wildly in the air this way and that as it steadily made it's way directly towards the treeline… of the _Forbidden Forest_.


	13. Ch 12 - Third Floor Corridor (Year 1)

Author's Note: This chapter is finally complete. Let me know if there are any errors while viewing it.

* * *

**Chapter 12**

**Third Floor Corridor**

**Year 1 - Hogwarts Castle - Earth**

As Malfoy struggled to keep Harry from taking the Rememberall out of his grasp, while also trying to maneuver his broomstick in such a way as to try and knock Potter off him, the broomstick in question suddenly began to descend below the treeline of the Forbidden Forest. The two rivals sped through the woods; dodging and ducking numerous obstacles along the way in their path, while also trying to knock each other off the broomstick.

Suddenly, as they were passing by a stand of trees on their right, Harry thought that he momentarily saw the flash of a red light, as well as heard what sounded like the mechanical and electrical noises of a droid of some kind.

**_PEW! … PEW! PEW! … PEW! … PEW!_**

Several red bolts of light instantly streaked past Draco's head without warning, and the blonde-haired little boy gasped in absolute shock and confusion, having no idea of what was going on. And as Harry glanced over his shoulder momentarily, he promptly caught a glimpse of an odd-looking probe droid racing towards the two boys in hot pursuit.

Pulling up on the broomstick, Malfoy went into an abrupt ninety-degree vertical climb out of the forest, hoping to get Potter off his broom, as well as put some distance between him and whatever it was that was behind him, but Harry grabbed onto the lower end of the broomstick in time, as he could sense what the blonde was about to do shortly before he did it. And upon making another almost immediate ninety-degree turn, followed-up with a quick barrel-roll, Draco flew back towards the castle with Harry still gripping onto the bottom end of the broom's handle rather tightly with both of his hands.

Upon them both coming up onto the grounds where the first-year Gryffindor and Slytherin students were all still standing and watching them, Harry promptly let go of Draco's broom with just one hand, while still gripping onto the lower end of the broomstick tightly with the other, and reached out with the Force: summoning his own broomstick to fly towards him. And right before Malfoy was just about to make another attempt to knock his rival off, Harry pushed off the broom with his hand and leapt into the air, before doing a forward somersault and landing on his own broom just as it streaked directly over Draco's head.

Harry then did a sharp one-hundred and eighty degree about-face on his broom, thus turning to confront his rival directly while also blocking Malfoy's path and causing the blonde to stop dead in mid-air, albeit with a very stunned expression on his face.

"Give the Rememberall here, Malfoy, or I'll knock you off your broom!" Potter demanded sharply.

Draco merely grinned rather cruelly at him. "Is that so?" the blonde replied in a cocky tone of voice.

Shooting forward like a javelin, Harry bolted at his rival on his own broom with insane speed; narrowly missing Draco by an inch, who in turn just barely dodged out of the way in time. Potter then made another quick sharp turn around and held his broom steady with a firm grip.

"Have it your way, then," said Malfoy, and with a lightning fast maneuver of his broom, the blonde spun around and flung his arm out like a baseball pitcher: throwing the Rememberall clear across the castle grounds.

Harry immediately bolted after the small glass ball in a heartbeat: chasing the Rememberall as it soared through the air. But as he did so, a bright bolt of red light zipped past him, which was followed by what sounded like an explosion of some kind, as well as the unmistakable voice of Malfoy crying out in shock and surprise, while down below on the ground, all of the students were screaming in confusion and terror. And upon briefly glancing behind him, Harry saw that the probe droid was back and that it had shot Draco's broom; literally blowing it to pieces and sending Malfoy flying.

As the Rememberall continued spinning through the air towards one of the many towers, Potter immediately summoned Force Speed and caught up to the tiny glass ball only mere seconds before it was about to crash through a glass window: promptly snatching it right out of the air in a quick forward somersault-like maneuver, before immediately turning right around and racing back towards Malfoy with inhuman speed: instantly catching the little boy in mid-fall only a split-second or two before Draco would have made direct contact with the ground below.

**_PEW!__ … PEW! PEW! PEW! __… PEW!__ … PEW! PEW!_**

Both the Gryffindor and Slytherin students all immediately ran screaming towards the safety of the castle as the probe droid continued to fire it's blaster in their general direction, while Harry dismounted his broom after releasing his grip on Malfoy, who in turn landed face-down on the grassy terrain with a soft thud.

**_PEW!__ … PEW! __… PEW!__ … PEW!_**

Draco immediately got to his feet and ran screaming as the probe droid kept-up with it's continuous onslaught. Harry, meanwhile, had reached out with the Force and summoned all the other broomsticks towards him, before flinging them at the probe droid like blunt spears as the droid either dodged or simply blasted them to pieces one after another.

"_HARRY POTTER!_" came a sudden and familiar voice.

The little boy turned his head to see Professor McGonagall coming towards him from a distance. "Professor, please, stay back!" he shouted, while continuing to dodge the hailstorm of blaster fire.

**_PEW!__ … PEW! __… PEW! __… PEW! __… PEW! __… PEW!_**

As the blaster fire continued on, Harry pulled out his wand and pointed it directly at where he believed one of the droid's weak-points was located.

"Flipendo Tria!" the little boy yelled half-loudly.

Suddenly, the wind began to blow rather quite strong and hard as a cyclonic gust of air promptly emanated out from the tip of Potter's wand and motioned towards the probe droid, which in turn got itself caught-up in the path of the miniature twister's eye. And as the probe droid kept on spinning round and round within the tiny windstorm, it began firing random blaster shots in every direction, trying unsuccessfully to pinpoint the source of the phenomenon.

Thrusting his hand out in front of him, Harry used a powerful Force Push to send both the miniature twister and the probe droid out towards the lake area near the castle grounds. And as the cyclone slowly made contact with the lake-water, it began to siphon the dark liquid up into it's funnel, thus causing the probe droid to instantly malfunction and short-circuit it's internal sensors and components upon getting wet.

**_**BOOM!**_**

All of a sudden, the probe droid exploded into a million tiny fragments, while the miniature tornado seemingly dissipated before finally vanishing altogether.

Harry instantly turned around to see whether anyone was hurt or not, only to find McGonagall standing alone with a somewhat shocked and confused look on her face.

"Professor, are you alright?" the little boy asked.

McGonagall nodded her head in response after a brief moment. "Yes, Potter, I'm fine," she asserted quietly. "Now, please, follow me."

Potter let his head slump down to his shoulders almost at once; he was absolutely sure that the Professor had witnessed (_at least partially_) what had transpired between him and Malfoy while they were on their broomsticks, and he was certain that McGonagall was going to expel him for that.

As the Professor made her way back to the castle with Harry walking a bit numbly in her wake, up the front steps, up the marble staircase inside, marching swiftly through hallways and corridors throughout, while wrenching open doors in her path, she didn't say anything to him the whole time. Maybe she was taking him straight to Dumbledore.

Continuously walking through corridor after corridor, McGonagall finally stopped just outside a classroom door. She momentarily turned to face Harry. "Wait here, Potter," she firmly instructed him.

Harry nodded to the Professor obediently, but with still a nervous look about him.

Minerva then turned around and opened the door to the classroom; immediately poking her head inside.

"Excuse me, Professor Flitwick, could I borrow Wood for a moment, please?" she asked the dwarfish Professor, who was in turn standing atop a very tall pile of books.

"Oh - Oh, yes, of course," replied the tiny Professor graciously.

Not a moment later, a tall burly fifth-year student walked casually out of Flitwick's class looking rather confused. McGonagall then led the two boys through the corridor and into an adjacent classroom, where Peeves was busy scribbling rude words on a blackboard.

"Out, Peeves! _NOW!_" the Professor barked sharply, thus causing both of the boys to jolt back slightly.

Peeves, appearing rather irked by Minerva's harsh command, threw the chalk into a nearby bin, which clanged loudly, and he swooped out of the room grumbling and cursing in a low whisper. And once he was into the corridor, the Professor promptly slammed the door shut behind him, before turning to face the two boys directly.

"Potter, this is Oliver Wood," said Minerva, and Harry nodded in greeting to him, who in turn nodded back, with the Professor then fixing her gaze on the fifth-year: her eyes bright with what seemed to be a twinge of excitement. "Wood - I've found you a Seeker."

The older boy's expression immediately changed from one of total puzzlement to overwhelming delight.

"Are you serious, Professor?" he asked with sheer anticipation that the answer which he was hoping for was most certainly going to be "_yes._"

"Absolutely, Wood," said McGonagall crisply. "The boy's a natural. I've never seen anything like it before in all my years." She then looked down at Harry. "Tell me, was that you're first time on a broomstick, Potter?"

Harry nodded at once, silently. He pretended to not have the slightest clue as to what was going on, even though he'd learned all about what a Seeker was from Sirius while at the Jedi Temple, as well as hearing about it constantly from the other first-year students who came from wizarding families. And he was most relieved to discover that it appeared he wasn't going to get expelled from Hogwarts after all. Because, if he had gotten expelled from school, it would have most certainly been a rather devastating blow for his godfather to learn that he'd been kicked out.

Professor McGonagall then told Wood all about what she had just witnessed a moment ago; of seeing the little boy flying directly towards her window and subsequently catching the Rememberall with one hand in mid-air before coming to an abrupt halt while in flight.

Upon hearing what Minerva had told him just now about Harry's remarkable flying skills, Wood suddenly looked as though all his dreams had come true at once.

"You ever seen a game of Quidditch, Potter?" he asked the little boy excitedly.

Harry immediately shook his head, even though he'd heard all about the sport from practically every one of the first-year students (_excluding many of the half-bloods and all of the Muggle-borns_) at the school.

"Wood's captain of the Gryffindor team," Professor McGonagall explained.

The older boy began to walk around Harry, looking him over from head to foot. "He's just the right build for a Seeker, too," Wood stated. "Light - speedy - we'll have to get him a decent broom, Professor - a Nimbus Two Thousand or a Cleansweep Seven, I'd say."

"I'll speak to Professor Dumbledore and see if we can't bend the first year rule," replied McGonagall. "Heaven knows, we need a much better team than last year. _Flattened_ in that last match by Slytherin, I couldn't look Severus Snape in the face for weeks…"

That evening, while everyone was eating dinner in the Great Hall, Potter told his closest friends (_Ron, Parvati, and Neville_) all about what had transpired between him, the fifth-year student, Oliver Wood, and Professor McGonagall. He'd hoped to speak directly with Dumbledore about the incident concerning the probe droid, or at the very least, hoped that Minerva would mention it to the Headmaster as soon as possible, but the little boy unfortunately never got the chance to say anything to the Head of Gryffindor House, as she had immediately turned on her heal and hurried at once out the door of the empty classroom, right after her conversation had ended with the two boys.

"You're joking," exclaimed Ron, who had a piece of steak and kidney pie halfway up to his mouth, but had decidedly lowered his fork back onto his plate the moment he'd heard what Harry had told him. "_Seeker?_ Are you serious?"

Harry nodded abruptly in response to his friend's question, given that his mouth was full of food.

Neville leaned in closer towards them. "But, Harry, you ought to know that first-years _never_ make the House team."

"You must be the youngest Quidditch player in a century," Parvati added.

"According to McGonagall," Harry immediately noted after swallowing the food in his mouth.

"So when does training for the Quidditch team start?" asked Neville eagerly.

"Next week," answered Harry. "Only, promise not to tell anyone. Wood wants to keep it a secret."

Ron immediately scoffed. "Fat chance of that being kept a secret for very long, Harry," he remarked half-snobbishly. "I mean, you can count on me not to spill the beans. But if I know Fred and George, they've already-"

Just at that very moment, the redhead's two older twin siblings came into the hall, who instantly hurried over the minute they spotted Harry sitting with their little brother, as well as Neville, and Parvati.

"Well done, Harry," said George in a low voice. "Wood's just told us. We're on the team, too - Beaters."

"Our job is to make sure _you_ don't get bloodied up too bad," added Fred. "Can't make any promises, of course. Rough game, Quidditch is."

Harry promptly cocked his head slightly at the older Weasley's last part of his comment, as it closely mimicked Master Yoda's peculiar form of speech.

"Brutal. But no one's died in years," George immediately chimed in again. "Someone will vanish on occasion, but they'll inevitably turn up within a month or two."

"Anyway, we've got to go, Lee Jordan reckons he's found a new secret passageway out of the school," Fred claimed with anticipation.

"I'll bet it's that same one behind the statue of Gregory the Smarmy that we found in our first week," George surmised at once. "See ya."

As the Weasley twins both hurried out of the Great Hall and disappeared, Harry promptly let both his head and eyes fall ever so slightly with dread upon hearing what the older boys had just now told him.

"Oh, go on, Harry," said Ron, who immediately noticed his friend's downbeat expression and tried to cheer him up. "Quidditch is great. Best game there is-"

"But I've never even played Quidditch, Ron," Harry interrupted. "What if I make a fool of myself? _Especially in front of Malfoy?_"

"Harry, I told you before, you _won't_ make a fool of yourself," the redhead insisted. "Look at what you did just this afternoon. You'll be great, I promise."

Potter, unfortunately, didn't feel any amount of encouragement from his friend's supposedly uplifting statement. And after the students had all returned to their Common Rooms for the night, instead of going straight off to bed, Harry stayed up for awhile; sitting with his knees bent almost all the way up to his chest, as he was partially huddled-up in the windowsill of the boy's dormitory, with Hedwig quietly perched nearby.

A few days later, Wood had approached Harry and asked him to come down to the Quidditch pitch that was situated on the school grounds at around three-fifteen that afternoon. When the young Padawan Learner had arrived at the entrance to the gigantic stadium, the wooden double-doors to the field opened wide to reveal the fifth-year student, just beyond the opposite end of a long archway, who in turn was patiently waiting for the little boy to show up.

Upon reaching the other end of the archway, Wood then gestured towards a large wooden chest that was on the ground near to where he was standing, and together the two boys picked up the crate; steadily carrying it across the green toward the pitch's exact center. Once they reached the middle circle and slowly placed the chest down on the ground, Oliver turned to face Harry.

"Right," said Wood. "Now, Quidditch is easy enough to understand, even if it's not too easy to play." He then began to explain to Harry all the ins and outs of how the game was played; what types of players there were per team, what kinds of balls there were in the game and what each type was for, how to score points, how to win the game, etc. "You with me so far?" he asked Potter after running through what was essentially a crash course with him.

Harry instantly nodded understandably in reply to the fifth-year's question.

Over the next several hours, Wood and Potter both practiced their respective rolls (_as Keeper and Seeker_) for the upcoming game that was set to take place only but one month away in November.

As the sun began to set down towards the horizon, both Harry and Oliver casually strode back to the castle, with the fifth-year student looking rather exhilarated and even a bit zealous after having just witnessed for himself what potential the little boy strolling along beside him had, as well as what the young Jedi Padawan was capable of doing, while on a broomstick.

"That Quidditch Cup'll have our name on it this year for sure," Wood exclaimed happily. "I wouldn't be surprised at all if you turn out better than Charlie Weasley, and he could have played for England had he not gone off chasing dragons."

Perhaps it was because he was now so busy, what with Quidditch practice three evenings a week on top of all his homework that he had been assigned, but Harry could hardly believe it when he realized that he'd already been at Hogwarts for approximately two whole months now. And even though it was becoming colder and colder outside on the school grounds practically with each passing day, the castle itself was relatively warm and cozy inside. Plus, the school felt just as much like home to the young Padawan Learner as the Jedi Temple itself had back on Coruscant, although with the amount of studying Potter had to do for his classes, he found it harder to have time (_let alone make time, for that matter_) to further his Jedi training.

On one fateful evening merely a day or so before Halloween, while Harry, Ron, Neville, and Parvati were all quietly walking back towards the Gryffindor Common Room after having finished with their classes, the four friends quite unexpectedly bumped into Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle along one of the staircases.

"Well, well," said Draco rather bitterly, "I should have expected that I'd run into you, Potter. What's this I hear about you being on the Gryffindor Quidditch team this year?"

"That's right, I am on the Quidditch team for Gryffindor," replied Harry, seeming a bit irritated with Draco's particularly sour tone of voice. "Though, it's really no concern of yours, given that you yourself are not on the Slytherin's team yet."

Draco's face immediately turned red and he balled-up his fist in rage, when all of a sudden the staircase began to move, and all seven children had to grab ahold of the railing to prevent any one of them from falling off; thus effectively sending them tumbling down to the lower floors to their death. A moment later, though, the staircase immediately stopped at an upper floor from where it had just been positioned at a moment earlier.

"What just happened?" asked Goyle in confusion.

"The staircase changed it's position," Harry answered, before looking down at Ron who was standing a few steps behind him. "Remember, Percy said that the staircases like to change from time to time when he first lead us to the Gryffindor Common Room."

Ron immediately nodded in reply. "Let's go up this way," he suggested, pointing towards the upper floor that was now directly ahead of them, "before the staircase moves again."

The children immediately climbed up the remaining stairs to an archway that lead directly to a wooden door. Harry grabbed hold of the handle before slowly pushing it open, just enough to briefly peer inside, and then softly planted one foot through the doorway to take an even closer look at what was on the opposite end; it was merely a rather long and narrow corridor that extended out for quite a bit on either side of the door, which thankfully appeared to be empty.

"Come on, in here," said Harry quietly, gesturing with a nod to the others to follow him into the deserted passageway.

Ron, Neville, and Parvati had all barely made it through the doorway into the long hall, when all of a sudden-

****_SLAM!_****

The door instantly shut closed behind them with a very loud rattling noise. Harry was about to go for the handle, as he could faintly make out the hysterical laughter of Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle just on the other side, when a very familiar (_and very unwelcome_) voice range-out from a great distance away clear on the far end of the long corridor.

"_Who's there!?_" it called sharply. "Who is it!? I know you're in here!"

It was non-other than Argus Filch, who was grimy patrolling the school corridors, as he'd always done each and every night.

"_Psst! This way!_" whispered Harry, and the four of them quickly (_but very quietly_) made their way down the opposite end of the hall, away from Filch's voice, until they came to another large wooden doorway.

Ron instantly reached for the handle the moment he heard Filch's voice steadily coming ever closer. "Oh, no! It's locked!" he exclaimed in a panicked tone. "That's it. We're done for."

"I've got this," Harry stated, and upon reaching out with the Force, he waved his hand slightly, thereby unlocking the door.

"_Where are you?_" called Filch, who must have heard the latch unbolt on the door. "_You'll be out of this school the moment I find you!_"

"_Quick! Get inside! Hurry!_" whispered Harry just as he opened the door up as slowly and as quietly as he could.

All four children immediately slipped through the cracked doorway, which was slightly more than wide enough for them all to get through, before Potter then shut the door tightly behind him again.

"_Ah, Harry!_" Ron suddenly whimpered slightly in a barely audible tone of voice. "_I think I know why Dumbledore said no one is allowed on the third floor!_"

The young Padawan Learner immediately turned around to see what it was that had gotten his friend in such a distressed state. He then noticed that both Neville and Parvati were shaking a bit uncontrollably, as well. And upon glancing past the three others in the room, Potter suddenly realized as well as understood why they were completely scared out of their minds; because lying on the floor, just a few feet away from them, was a monstrously gigantic dog with three enormous heads. And although it luckily appeared to be sleeping soundly, it most certainly wouldn't stay that way for much longer.


	14. Ch 13 - Trolling The Castle (Year 1)

Author's Note: This next chapter is now fully finished. Please read and review.

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**Chapter 13**

**Trolling The Castle**

**Year 1 - Hogwarts Castle - Earth**

Ron slowly turned around just enough to look at Harry with absolute terror on his face: there was a gigantic three-headed beast in the guise of a dog which was lying on the floor sound asleep only but a few feet away from them.

Harry, although a bit stunned at first by the mere presence of the creature, took a deep breath in before very slowly as well as quietly stepping ever so lightly past his friends and motioned towards the central head of monstrously large creature. The little boy didn't know why, but something inside was telling him to approach the humongous animal, yet to the immediate viewpoint of the other three students present, it seemed as though Potter had gone mad and was trying to get himself eaten alive.

Neville wanted so rather desperately to tell Harry not to move even a single step closer towards the monstrous canine-like beast, and to say that he was totally plumb crazy for even thinking of doing such a colossally stupid thing at all in the first place, but he dared not utter even the tiniest sound, lest he cause the immensely large creature in front of them all to promptly wake up, then they'd be kibble.

Upon reaching the middle head of the gigantic monstrosity before him, Potter immediately placed one hand on his forehead, while at the same time, leaning forward slightly and placing his other hand on the animal's furry brow.

Ron, Neville, and Parvati all stared a one another in genuine and complete horror upon all three of them witnessing whatever it was that Harry was doing, of which none of them could clearing make out, let alone understand what it was that the young Padawan Learner was trying to accomplish. Although, the only thing they did understand was that whatever it was that Potter was doing just now, it was sure to get them all killed within the next few seconds.

After several tense and heart-pounding moments, the ginormous canine-like animal slowly began to stir from it's deep slumber and it opened all six of it's eyes, just as Harry steadily removed his hand from the creature's forehead while gently lowering his other hand down to his side and quietly taking several steps backward to rejoin his friends, who all immediately gasped in utter fright at the sight of the now awakened monster. _This was it, they were all going to die here within seconds; both quickly as well as painfully. What had they been thinking, going up to the third floor corridor, of which they were strictly forbidden not to do. And now they knew, albeit too late, why that was._

The dog slowly lifted up all three of it's heads at once, and quite unexpectedly to the sudden and downright shock and confusion of Ron, Neville, and Parvati, simply eyed all four of the children in both wonder and curiosity, instead of swiftly lunging forward with all three of it's fang-covered mouths wide-open and ready to gorge the children to bloody shreds, as the three of them (_apart from Harry_) had been expecting it to do.

Ron very slowly shifted his gaze just a little over toward Harry. "Uh, Harry? What's going on?" he whispered nervously, looking quite rather bewildered.

Before the students could say or do anything more, they promptly heard very distant but loud footsteps slowly approached their precise location, as well as a familiar voice calling out at them from the other side of the door, which seemed to get louder and clearer with each sound of a step that was heard.

"_I know you're in there!_" the voice declared sharply. It was Filch. He must have figured out where the four students were hiding. "_This is the end of Hogwarts for you lot!_"

Harry briefly turned his attention to the three-headed dog, before gesturing to the others for them to hide just as they could all clearly hear the handle on the opposite side of the door being jiggled. And almost immediately thereafter, the large wooden door slowly creaked open, with Mrs. Norris rather nimbly stepping through the tiny crack in the doorway.

Upon lightly pushing the door fully open the rest of the way, Filch lifted up his lantern in order to see out in front of him; clearly expecting to find all four of the students standing just a few feet away, only to come face-to-face with a gigantic three-headed monster with eyes that seemed to glow in the dim light, and three sets of dripping white fangs which were salivating profusely once the massive animal had noticed both the caretaker and his pet cat.

**_**GRRR! … BARK**_**_‼_**_** BARK**_**_‼_**_** BARK**_**_‼_**_** … GRR!**__** … BARK**_**_‼_**_** BARK**_**_‼_****

Mrs. Norris instantly screeched in terror as all the fur on her body shot straight up and she promptly turned and bolted out of the chamber, with Filch literally screaming at the top of his lungs in bloody murder as he spun on his heels and flew out of the room himself, not even bothering to shut the door behind him. What both of them failed to notice in their haste was that all four of the students had huddled together up against the corner wall within the shadows to avoid detection.

Ron promptly covered his mouth with his hand; trying desperately to keep himself from bursting out into a hysterical fit of laughter upon catching a glimpse of Filch's terrified expression, right before the caretaker ran screaming out of the room.

Harry once more reached out with the Force telepathically to the dog, and after a moment or so, the great three-headed beast finally calmed right down, thus allowing the four Hogwarts students to then exit both the chamber as well as the forbidden corridor, though not before they distinctly heard the sound of loud whimpers and growls coming from the creature directly behind them, right before closing and re-locking the door. Potter had briefly poked his head through a crack in it: promising the humongous animal that's he come back as soon as he could with something for the creature to eat, before softly shutting the door behind him.

"Did any of you see that look on Filch's face?" asked Ron, who immediately fell over backwards onto a soda; laughing uncontrollably, the moment that all four of the children had gotten back to the Common Room in the Gryffindor Tower, with Harry, Neville, and Parvati also joining in the hysterics. Though, nowhere near as much as Weasley was. "_That was absolutely priceless!_"

"Not to mention the way his cat looked the moment she saw that thing!" added Parvati with a chuckle.

Potter almost fell over backwards with laughter upon him remembering that he _had_ just barely caught a glimpse of Filch's cat, and the mere sight of the feline shooting several inches up off the floor while the fur all over her body straightened-up like pin needles, was positively hilarious. But he also then momentarily recalled seeing that the giant three-headed black dog had apparently been standing on top of something when it stood-up on all fours: immediately lunging for Fitch and Mrs. Norris to try and attack them. And to Harry, the thing which the dog was standing on looked to be something very much like a trap door.

As the four friends went up to their respective dormitories to get ready for bed, Harry wondered just what it was that the three-headed dog was perhaps guarding, if indeed the thing that it was standing on _was_ a trap door. And if that was so, where did the trap door lead to, and what could be so important that it required a gigantic three-headed beast to safeguard it at all times within the castle?

Harry immediately climbed into bed and slid himself beneath the warm covers and sheets: his mind continuously swirling with questions regarding both the presence of the three-head dog as well as the possibility of there being a rather mysterious trap door underneath it's paws and what lay beneath it.

On Halloween, the whole student-body had gone outside to decorate pumpkins and make jack-o-lanterns out of them after classes, which would then be charmed and put on display in the Great Hall: each and every one of them flowing high above the House tables, just in time for the upcoming feast on Halloween Night.

When everyone had entered into the Great Hall that evening to partake in the feast, Harry glanced up and immediately noticed that approximately a thousand live bats fluttered off the walls and ceiling while a thousand more swooped over the tables in low black clouds, thus making the candles inside the pumpkins and jack-o-lanterns stutter. Potter looked around until he'd found the lantern that he'd made, along with the ones that Ron, Neville, and Parvati had carved-out also.

Soon after everyone had found their seats around each of the four tables, the feast appeared quite suddenly on the golden plates that were neatly placed across both rows on each table along with the golden utensils and crystal goblets, just as it had at the start-of-term banquet.

A few minutes later, Harry was just helping himself to a baked potato when Professor Quirrell came sprinting into the hall, his turban askew and terror on his face. Everyone stared as he reached Professor Dumbledore's chair, slumped against the table, and gasped, "Troll - in the dungeons - thought you ought to know." He then immediately passed out and sank to the floor.

There was an instantaneous uproar as the first-year students (_except for Harry_) began screaming and yelling in complete fear at the sight of Quirrell: many of them thinking to themselves all at once that he must be ether gravely injured… or worse.

Dumbledore stood up from his seat at the High Table at once as he pulled out his wand and pointed it towards the ceiling. "_SILENCE!_" he bellowed loudly, as several purple firecrackers exploded from the tip of his wand.

The massive chamber instantly fell quiet like a tomb as everyone promptly stopped what they were doing, thus allowing the Headmaster to lower his voice a bit.

"Everyone will please not panic," said Dumbledore in a calm but stern manner, before lowering his voice even more after a brief pause. "Now… Prefects, lead your Houses back to the dormitories immediately. Teachers, follow me to the dungeons at once."

Percy immediately beamed upon hearing this, as he was in his element now. And he very much enjoyed nothing more or less than to give orders and be in charge.

"Follow me! Stick together, first-years!" he instructed the Gryffindor students quite clearly as he lead all of them out of the Great Hall. "No need to fear the troll if you all follow my orders!"

Ron immediately rolled his eyes and sighed heavily in disgust, as his _dear_ older brother was coming off as little more than a rather obnoxiously and often embarrassingly rude prat more and more as the school-year dragged on. And as the group entered into a corridor, with Percy not even bothering to shut his yap for just one freakin' second about how important it was that everyone stay close to him because he was a Prefect and they should do as he told them to, the students all of a sudden found themselves confronted by the twelve-foot high mountain troll.

"Everyone stay back. I've got this," declared Percy quite confidently as he momentarily turned around to look at the students, "Now, let me show you all how to _properly_ deal with a troll. Watch closely."

**_WHAM__‼_**

Nearly everyone shrieked in terror as Percy was instantly knocked off his feet and flung across to the opposite end of the corridor the moment that the troll's huge wooden club made direct physical contact with his body, and the redhead landed unconscious with a thud onto the stone floor near to a wall.

"_I'm watching,_" Ron responded sarcastically to his brother's prideful comment with an irritated expression on his face while shaking his head, before quickly swerving and then diving out of the way of the troll's massive club just in time as it came down, while everyone else (_excluding Harry, Neville, and Parvati_) immediately scattered in a panic.

"What do we do?" asked Parvati, looking at her friends with utter confusion as she continuously ducked and dodged the troll's weapon over and over again.

Neville all of a sudden realized that his feet were no longer touching the ground, as the troll had grabbed ahold of him, and lifted the little boy into the air: holding him aloft by his ankles. "Whoa!" he cried in alarm. "Do something!"

The troll immediately went for Longbottom's head with it's enormous club, but missed hitting it's target by a mere few inches.

"What?" Ron asked in utter confusion, not knowing what to do at all in this current predicament.

Immediately remembering the spell that Professor Flitwick had taught in Charms Class, Harry pulled out his wand, did the "_swish and flick_" movement with his wrist, and spoke the incantation of the Levitation Charm.

"_Wingardium Leviosa!_" he shouted, and the troll's heavy wooden club was instantaneously yanked from it's grasp, just as the weapon was about to be brought to bear down upon Neville's head.

Upon realizing that it no longer had it's weapon in-hand, the troll slowly looked around in confusion before glancing upwards; noticing immediately that it's rather large club was somehow floating about aimlessly above it's small head.

**_BONK!_**

The wooden club immediately fell with a loud thud onto its owner's skull, and the troll began to sway back and forth on the spot in a daze, before falling forwards heavily onto it's face with a loud rumble that caused the entire hallway to momentarily quake.

"_Neville!_" exclaimed Parvati in a worried tone upon seeing the little boy being dropped to the ground by the troll, right before the ugly creature had fainted, and tumbled over onto his back. "Are you okay? You're not hurt, are you?"

"I'm fine," answered Longbottom while getting to his feet and dusting himself off, appearing to not have sustained any injuries.

An instant or two later, Professor McGonagall came running through the corridor as fast as she could go, who in turn was closely followed by Snape, with Quirrell bringing up the rear.

Snape bent over the troll, while Quirrell took one glance at the foul creature and stumbled back up against the wall behind him as he let out a faint whimper: clutching at his heart. Minerva, on the other hand, was looking squarely at the four students standing before her, who in turn were all glancing about at one another nervously.

Harry, in particular, had never once seen Professor McGonagall appear so angry before. Her lips were white, her face bright red, and she appeared to be slightly shaking.

"Explain yourselves!" she immediately bellowed with a fiery edge to her voice. "_NOW!_"

"W- We were all heading back to the Gryffindor Tower and to the Common Room as Professor Dumbledore had instructed," remarked Ron with a brief stammer. "Percy was at the front of our group when we all of a sudden came face-to-face with the troll, as it was blocking our way toward the staircases and up to the tower. He wouldn't shut up about how we had nothing to fear if we did what he said. And when we were confronted by the troll, he stupidly claimed that he could deal with this situation all by himself."

"Harry was the one who managed to knock the troll out by using the Levitation Charm on it, though, Professor," added Parvati.

McGonagall looked over at Harry immediately for conformation of the girl's calm. "Is this true, Potter?" she inquired.

The little boy nodded his head at once in response. "Yes, it's true, Professor," he stated instantaneously with a firm and direct tone of voice.

All three Professors glanced at one another in total amazement, though Snape himself seemed be the least bit impressed out of all of them by the fact that Harry was the one to accomplish what no other first-year student in the whole history of Hogwarts could possibly hope to do, and still be alive to tell about it.

"_Humph!_" grumbled Snape most irritably. "Already taking credit for being the first ever student to have bested a fully-grown mountain troll, are you? You're nothing more than a pompous and arrogantly selfish prat, just like your father was, boy!"

Harry's face instantly turned red with anger. "I'm not a prat!" he spat bitterly at the greasy-haired Professor. "And don't you _dare_ talk about my father that way!"

"_Enough!_" snapped Minerva in a voice of fury. "_Both of you!_"

Without so much as even acknowledging either McGonagall or Quirrell, Snap turned at once on the spot in a huff and madly stomped off down the corridor and was out of sight within moments.

After checking on Percy Weasley's condition, and seeing that the boy _was_ greatly injured due to the impact of the blow from the mountain troll's club (_wherein he had several broken bones and lacerations, busted up ribs, a concussion, as well as many other varying injuries throughout his body_), Professor McGonagall immediately sent word of the situation to Madam Pomfrey at the school's Hospital Wing. A moment later, a small band of House-elves appeared and promptly levitated the older Weasley boy up off the stone floor: vanishing just as suddenly as they had appeared with the fifth-year Prefect in tow.

"Now, as for the rest of you," Professor McGonagall said as she turned to address Harry, Ron, Neville, and Parvati once more, "the four of you had best get yourselves back up to the Gryffindor Tower immediately. I will not have any of my students wandering aimlessly about the castle this late at night looking for trouble. Am I understood?"

All four students instantly nodded their heads at her in obedient replies while also glancing at each other assuredly, hoping that she wasn't about to remove House points because of this incident.

"Good," said McGonagall, and she turned to leave, before promptly turning around to face Harry again. "Oh, before I forget - five points with be awarded to you, Mr. Potter. For sheer dumb luck."

The expressions on the faces of all four students immediately lit-up and they looked at one another with unsustainable excitement at what they had just heard the Gryffindor Head of House say to them. And while passing by Quirrell as they were walking back to the Gryffindor Common Room, Harry all of a sudden heard the pained small voice of the baby crying inside his head again the minute that the Professor turned his back to the children.

By now, Potter was very much wanting to find out exactly what was going on whenever he was anywhere within the general proximity of Professor Quirrell, and why he was hearing the distressed voice of some baby inside his mind whenever the Professor's back was turned to him, as it was starting to get a bit old, frankly. Harry needed to find answers to these and so many other lingering questions now more than ever.


End file.
